UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


UNIVERSITY  of  CALIFORNIA 
LUS  ANGELES 


amencan  Comtnontcealtljjs* 


EDITED    BY 


HORACE  E.  SCUDDEli. 


.>   /•  I-. 


w 


^Hmerican  Coiiinionlucaltfjj^ 


MISSOURI 


A  BONE   OF  CONTENTION 


LUCIEN  CARR 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK      • 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND   COMPANY 

1888 


57330 


Copyright,  1888, 
By  LUCIEN   CARR. 

AU  rights  reserved. 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge  : 
Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  H.  0.  Houghton  &  Co. 


v'V  V   ^  C 


^ 


X 


PREFATORY   NOTE. 


In  the  preparation  of  this  vohime  the  following  works 
have  heen  found  of  service,  though  it  is  proper  to  add 
that  the  list  is  by  no  means  complete,  and  that  it  does 
not  include  any  of  the  authoritative  publications  that 
have  found  their  way  into  the  newspapers  and  maga- 
zines of  the  day. 

Bancroft,  H.  H.     History  of  the  Pacific  States.     San  Francisco. 
Barbe-Makbois.     Histoire  de  la  Louisiane.     Paris,  1829. 
Barnes,  C.  R.  ,  editor.     Commonwealtli  of  Missouri.     St.  Louis, 

1877. 
Benton,  Thomas  H.     Thirty  Years  in  the  Senate  of  the  United 

States.     New  York,    1856.      Abridgment  of    the    Debates  in 

Congress,  from  1789  to  1856.     New  York. 
Bevier,  R.  S.     History  of  the  1st  and  2d  Missouri  Confederate 

Brigades.     From  Wakarusa  to  Appomattox.     St.  Louis,  1879. 
Billon,  F.  L.     Annals  of  St.  Louis.     St.  Louis,  1886. 
Brackenridge,  H.  M.     "Views  of  Louisiana.     Pittsburgh,   1814. 

Recollections  of  the  West,  2d  edition.     Philadelphia,  1868. 
Brown,  G.  W.     Reminiscences  of  Old  John  Brown.     Rockford, 

111.,  1880. 
Buchanan's  Administration.     New  York,  1866. 
Cooke,  P.  St.  George.     Conquest  of  California  and  New  Mex- 
ico.    New  York,  1878. 
Davis  and  Durrie.     History  of  Missouri.     Cincinnati,  1876. 
Edwards,  Richard,  and  M.  Hopewell.    The  Great  West.     St. 

Louis,  1860. 
Flint,  Timothy.     Travels.     Boston,  1826. 


vi  PREFATORY  NOTE. 

Gayakr^,  Charles.    History  of  Louisiana.    New  Orleans,  1885. 

Hughes,  John  T.     DouipLan's  Expedition.     Cincinnati,  1848. 

Laws  of  the  United  States. 

Laws  of  the  State  of  Missouri. 

LuNT,  Geokge.     Origin  of  the  Late  War.     New  York,  1866. 

Makgry,  Pierre.  D^couverte  de  I'Amerique  Septentrionale. 
Paris. 

Martin,  F.  X.     History  of  Louisiana.     New  Orleans,  1827. 

Niles'  Register. 

Official  Records  of  the  Rebellion.     Washington. 

Parkman,  Francis.  Discovery  of  the  Great  West.  Boston, 
1869. 

Peckham,  James.     General  Nathaniel  Lyon.     New  York,  1866. 

Proceedings  of  Congress. 

Proceedings  of  the  Legislature  of  Missouri. 

Proceedings  of  Missouri  State  Conventions,  1861  and  1865. 

Sanborn,  F.  B.  Life  and  Letters  of  John  Brown.  Boston, 
1885. 

ScHARF,  J.  T.     History  of  St.  Louis.     Philadelphia,  1883. 

Shea,  John  G.  Discovery  and  Exploration  of  the  Mississippi. 
New  York,  1852. 

Snead,  Thomas  L.     The  Fight  for  Missoirri.     New  York,  1886. 

Stoddard,  ]\Iajor  Amos.  Sketches  of  Louisiana.  Philadel- 
phia, 1812. 

Von  Holst.  Constitutional  History  of  the  United  States.  Chi- 
cago. 

Wilkinson,  General  James.  Memoirs  of  my  own  Times. 
Philadelphia,  1816. 

WiNSOR,  Justin,  Editor.  Narrative  and  Critical  History  of 
America.     Boston. 

The  writer  desires  also  to  acknowledge  his  obligations 
to  Messrs.  Oscar  W.  Collet,  of  the  Missouri  Historical 
Society,  John  N.  Dyer,  of  the  Mercantile  Library  of 
St.  Louis,  General  James  Harding,  Railroad  Commis- 
sioner of  the  State,  and  to  Alfred  Carr,  of  the  Insurance 
Department ;  to  Ex-Governors  Thomas  C.  Fletcher  and 
Charles  H.  Hardin,  General  D.  M.  Frost  of  the  Con- 


PREFATORY  NOTE.  Vll 

federate  service,  and  to  Messrs.  James  O.  Broadhoad 
and  Thomas  T.  Ganett,  who  as  members  of  the  Constitu- 
tional Convention,  and  in  other  capacities,  did  good  ser- 
vice for  the  Union.  To  Mr.  R.  J.  Holcombe  of  Chilli- 
cothe,  Missouri,  Andrew  McF.  Davis  of  Cambridge, 
Mass.,  and  John  Henry  Brown  of  Dallas,  Texas,  the 
friend  and  aid-de-camj)  of  General  McCulloch,  he  is  es- 
pecially indebted  for  friendly  counsel  and  assistance. 
Cambridge,  jMass.,  May  1,  1888. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER   I. 

PAGE 

Discovery  and  Exploration  of  the  Mississippi  ...       1 

CHAPTER  II. 
French  Domination  in  the  Mississippi  Valley  ...    21 

CHAPTER  III. 
Spanish  Domination 36 

CHAPTER  IV. 
The  Louisiana  Purchase 63' 

CHAPTER  V. 
Louisiana  Territory:  1804  to  1812 82 

CHAPTER  VI. 
Missouri  Territory:  1813  to  1821 117 

CHAPTER  VIL 
The  Missouri  Compromise 139 

CHAPTER  VIII. 
The  Admission  of  Missouri  into  the  Union    ....  149 


X  CONTENTS, 

CHAPTER  IX. 
From  1820  to  1844 163 

CHAPTER  X. 

The  Annexation  of  Texas  and  the  Conquest  of  New 
Mexico 189 

CHAPTER  XI. 

The  Jackson  Resolutions  :  Internal  Improvements  : 
Education 220 

CHAPTER  XII. 

Kansas  Troubles:  Progress  of  the  State:  Election 
of  1860 241 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

The    Legislature  and    the  Constitutional    Conyen- 
tion:  Missouri  decides  for  the  Union 267 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

The  Arsenal,  Camp  Jackson,  and  the  Second  Meeting 
of  the  Convention 291 

CHAPTER  XV. 

Springfield     and     Lexington:     the    Confederates 
evacuate  the  State 324 

CHAPTER  XVI. 

From  the  Evacuation  of  the  State  to  the  End  of 
THE  War 342 

CHAPTER  XVII. 

Abolition  of  Slavery:  The  Convention  of  1865  and 
Test  Oaths 363 


MISSOURI. 


CHAPTER  I. 

DISCOVERY    AND    EXPLORATION    OF    THE    MISSISSIPPI. 

Although  the  French  were  the  first  to  explore  the 
Mississippi,  to  map  out  its  course,  and  to  estabUsh  per- 
manent settlements  upon  its  banks,  they  were  not  its 
discoverers  ;  neither  were  they  the  first  to  float  upon  its 
waters.  That  honor,  if  the  term  can  be  applied  to  what 
was  but  a  lucky  incident  in  a  mad  search  after  gold,  be- 
longs to  the  Spaniards,  and  is  usually  ascribed  to  Her- 
nando de  Soto,  though  upon  what  are  believed  to  be 
insufficient  grounds.  Without  stopping,  however,  to 
discuss  the  point,  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that  almost  a  cen- 
tury and  a  half  before  the  French  explorers  launched 
their  frail  canoes  upon  the  stream,  he  stood  upon  its 
banks ;  and  whilst  il  is  not  ^^ossible  to  make  out,  with 
any  degree  of  accuracy,  the  itinerary  of  his  journey, 
there  is  but  little  hazard  in  asserting  that  the  spot  from 
which  he  first  gazed  upon  its  turbid  waters  must  have 
been  at  or  near  the  place  where  the  city  of  Memphis 
now  stands. 

Whether  in  the  course  of  his  wanderings  he  reached 
the  confines  of  what  is  now  known  as  the  State  of  Mis- 
souri is  a  question  that  cannot  be  definitively  settled. 


2  MISSOURI. 

The  course  and  length  of  the  journey  wliich  he  is  said 
to  have  made,  after  crossing  the  river,  in  order  to  reach 
tlie  country  of  the  Capahas,  or,  as  they  are  novv^  called, 
the  Quapaws,  would  seem  to  indicate  that  he  did ;  the 
mounds  and  embankments,  too,  to  say  nothing  of  the 
other  evidences  of  prehistoric  life  that  are  found  in  such 
profusion  in  the  southeastern  portion  of  the  State,  an- 
swer, with  singular  fidelity,  to  the  descriptions  which  are 
given  of  the  houses  and  villages  of  these  people,  as  well 
as  of  their  implements  and  ornaments ;  and  if  to  this  be 
added  the  fact  that,  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  later, 
they  were  living  in  the  same  region,  though  not,  perhaps, 
in  the  identical  localities,  it  will  be  seen  that  a  strong 
presumptive  case  can  be  made  out  in  favor  of  the  truth 
of  the  theory.  However,  be  this  as  it  may,  it  is  not  a 
point  upon  which  we  care  to  insist,  for  even  if  the  fact 
be  admitted,  it  was  not  followed  by  any  practical  results. 
Like  Cortes,  Pizarro,  and  the  rest  of  the  Spanish  con= 
querors,  De  Soto  and  his  followers  were  jjrimarily,  not 
colonists,  but  adventurers  in  search  of  gold,  and  being 
disappointed  in  their  object,  they  had  no  thought  but  to 
quit  a  country  which  had  ceased  to  be  attractive.  Ac- 
cordingly in  1543,  after  two  years  more  of  wearisome 
marching  and  useless  fighting,  the  survivors  of  the  ex- 
pedition, reduced  in  numbers,  and  with  their  leader 
dead,  found  their  way  back  to  the  banks  of  the  river, 
and  down  it  they  sailed  in  hastily  constructed  brigan- 
tines,  glad  enough  to  escape  from  a  region  in  which, 
instead  of  wealth  and  ease,  they  had  met  with  nothing 
but  privation  and  hardship,  sickness  and  death. 

With  the  failure  of  this  expedition,  efforts  to  explore 
the  Mississipi^i  valley  were,  for  the  time  being,  brought 
to  a  close ;  and  it  was  not  until  after  the  lapse  of  a  hun- 


DISCOVERY  OF  THE  MISSISSIPPI.  6 

dred  and  thirty  years  that  the  work  was  again  taken 
up  and  carried  to  a  successful  conclusion.  In  the  mean 
time,  the  Atlantic  coast,  from  Florida  to  Canada,  had 
been  dotted  with  colonies.  Of  these,  some  were  com- 
paratively short  lived,  as,  for  instance,  the  settlements  of 
the  Dutch  and  Swedes  in  New  York  and  New  Jersey 
respectively;  others,  like  the  establishments  of  the  Span- 
iards in  Florida,  appear  to  have  been  always  in  a  mori- 
bund condition,  and  owed  what  little  success  they  had  to 
the  rivalry  of  their  neighbors,  rather  than  to  any  strength 
of  their  own  :  so  that  by  the  close  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  the  whole  of  the  vast  domain  that  lies  east  of 
the  Mississippi  and  south  of  Hudson's  Bay,  except,  per- 
haps, the  peninsula  of  Florida,  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
English  and  French. 

These  nations,  enemies  and  rivals  here,  as  they  had 
been  for  generations  on  the  other  side  of  the  water, 
were  among  the  earliest  to  engage  in  the  work  of  colo- 
nization. At  first,  their  efforts  met  with  but  little  suc- 
cess, and  it  was  not  until  after  repeated  failures  that  they 
succeeded,  in  the  first  decade  of  the  seventeenth  century, 
in  effecting  permanent  settlements  at  Jamestown  and 
Quebec.  Other  points  were  gradually  occupied,  and 
as  both  nations  claimed  the  whole  of  this  region,  and 
did  not  hesitate,  when  opportunity  offered,  to  treat  their 
rivals  as  interlopers,  it  soon  brought  on  that  long  and 
bloody  struggle  which,  beginning  with  Argall's  destruc- 
tion of  the  French  settlement  on  the  island  of  Mount 
Desert  in  1613,  was  only  ended,  a  hundred  and  fifty 
years  later,  by  the  victory  of  Wolfe  upon  the  Plains  of 
Abraham. 

In  watching  the  course  of  this  struggle,  or  rather  in 
noting  the  progress  of  these  colonies,  for  the  struggle 


4  MISSOURI. 

itself  interests  us  but  little,  we  cannot  but  be  struck 
with  the  contrast  that  exists  between  the  rapid  advance 
of  the  French  into  the  interior  of  the  continent  and  the 
slow  and  steady  growth  of  the  English  in  the  same 
direction.  -  As  early  as  1639,  only  about  thirty  years 
after  Quebec  was  founded,  Nicolet  was  upon  the  Wis- 
consin and  within  thi'ee  days'  travel  of  the  Mississippi, 
or  as  it  was  then  thought,  the  ocean  ;  and  in  1671,  be- 
fore the  Massachusetts  colonists  had  closed  in  the  death 
struggle  mth  King  Philip,  and  whilst  the  spot  where 
now  stands  the  city  of  PhiladeljDhia  was  still  a  part  of 
the  virgin  forest,  the  Jesuits  had  completed  the  circuit 
of  Lake  Superior,  and  were  anxiously  waiting  for  the 
word  which,  two  years  later,  sent  Joliet  and  Marquette 
on  their  voyage  down  the  Mississippi.  Various  reasons 
are  brought  forward  by  way  of  accounting  for  the  un- 
equal rate  at  which  the  colonies  of  these  two  nations 
moved  westward,  and,  so  far  as  the  French  are  concerned, 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  their  progress  in  this  direc- 
tion was  due  in  great  part  to  religious  enthusiasm  and 
the  necessities  of  the  fur-trade.  Unquestionably  there 
were  other  causes,  as,  for  instance,  the  facility  of  inter- 
communication and  the  hostility  of  the  Iroquois,  which 
contributed  either  to  hasten  or  retard  the  movement ; 
but  after  all,  in  its  last  analysis,  it  was  to  the  activity  of 
the  fur-trader  and  the  zeal  of  the  missionary  that  the 
French  were  indebted  for  their  early  acquaintance  with 
all  this  region. 

To  appreciate  the  full  extent  of  the  influence  which 
these  two  classes  exerted  in  bringing  about  this  result,  it 
is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind  that  they  had  controlled  the 
destinies  of  the  colony  from  its  very  foundation ;  and 
that,  no  matter  how  widely  they  may  have  differed  at 


DISCOVERT   OF   THE  MlSSISSIPPf.  5 

times  In  tlieii*  ends  and  aims,  they  were  always  alike  in 
so  far  as  they  both  depended,  for  their  continued  pros- 
perity, U2:)0n  the  extension  of  French  influence  among  the 
native  tribes.  To  them,  every  step  in  this  direction 
meant  an  increase  in  the  number  of  those  who  looked  to 
Quebec  for  a  market,  or  who  trusted  to  it  for  religious 
instruction,  and  hence  the  energy  with  which  they  pushed 
their  way  into  the  interior,  sought  out  new  alliances,  and 
established  posts  and  missions  wherever  there  was  a 
promise  of  a  commercial  or  a  spiritual  harvest. 

Urged  on  by  considerations  of  this  character,  the  R^- 
collet  fathers  visited  the  eastern  shores  of  Lake  Huron, 
and  established  themselves  among  the  people  of  that 
name  as  early  as  1615  ;  and,  by  the  middle  of  the  cen- 
tury, the  Jesuits,  who  had  succeeded  to  the  control  of 
the  religious  affairs  of  the  colony,  had  In  operation 
among  this  same  people  one  of  the  most  flourishing 
missions  that  has  ever  existed  among  our  North  Ameri- 
can Indians.  Unfortunately,  however,  for  the  success  of 
the  undertaking,  the  Iroquois  war  broke  out  afresh  about 
this  time,  and  those  grim  warriors,  having  obtained  a 
supply  of  firearms  from  the  English  and  Dutch  traders, 
soon  made  a  desert  of  all  the  region  that  lies  between 
the  Ottawa  and  the  lakes.  In  their  Insane  fury  they 
spared  neither  missionary  nor  medicine  man,  neither 
Christian  convert  nor  pagan  devotee. 

Of  those  who  escaped  the  general  ruin,  a  part  fled  to 
the  regions  west  of  the  Straits  of  MIchllimackinac,  and 
sought  refuge  along  the  southern  shores  of  Lake  Supe- 
rior. Hither,  in  due  time,  came  the  traders  and  the  no 
less  venturesome  missionaries,  and  in  this  distant  region 
they  resumed  the  work  which  had  met  with  such  a 
bloody  interruption.     AVith   characteristic    energy   they 


6  MISSOURI. 

established  posts  and  founded  missions  among  the  Hu- 
ron refugees  and  their  neighbors,  and  began  at  once 
that  series  of  explorations  which,  in  the  course  of  the 
next  fifteen  years,  not  only  made  the  French  familiar 
with  the  geography  of  the  upper  lakes,  but  bi'ought 
them  to  the  head  waters  of  streams  which,  flowing  to- 
wards the  southwest,  emptied  into  a  river  that  led  they 
knew  not  whither,  "  pei'haps  into  the  Sea  of  Virginia, 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  or  possibly  into  the  Vermillion  Sea  " 
and  the  Pacific  Ocean. 

Henceforward  the  discovery  of  this  river  and  of  the 
great  valley  through  which  it  flows  was  a  foregone  con- 
clusion. In  fact,  its  existence  seems  already  to  have 
been  generally  known  both  to  the  traders  and  the  mis- 
sionaries, for  there  is  scarcely  a  record  of  the  period  in 
which  the  references  to  it  are  not  more  or  less  frequent. 
In  1658  two  traders,  Radisson  and  Groseilliers,  win- 
tered on  the  shores  of  Lake  Superior,  and  brought  back 
stories  of  the  Sioux  and  of  the  great  river  upon  which 
they  dwelt.  A  few  years  later  Father  Allouez  confirmed 
their  account,  and  in  1669-70,  in  the  course  of  his  mis- 
sionary labors,  he  visited  the  Mascoutens,  who  were  then 
living  on  the  Wisconsin,  "  within  six  days'  sail  of  the 
Mississippi."  La  Salle,  too,  was  not  idle  ;  for  it  was 
about  this  time  that,  taking  advantage  of  a  lull  in  the 
Iroquois  war,  he  started  out  in  search  of  the  mysterious 
stream  ;  and,  though  the  evidence  is  not  sufficient  to 
prove  that  he  reached  it  during  the  course  of  this  ex- 
pedition, yet  there  seems  to  be  no  doubt  that  he  dis- 
covered the  Ohio,  and  perhaps  also  the  Illinois.  Last, 
but  not  least,  Marquette,  in  the  "  Relation  of  1670,"  re- 
ports what  the  Illinois  had  told  him  of  this  river  ;  and, 
in  his  far  distant  station,  near  the  western  extremity  of 


DISCOVERY  OF    THE  MISSIS'^ [fT I.  7 

Lake  Superior,  he  was  planning  a  visit  to  the  "  nations 
that  inhabit  it,  in  order  to  open  the  passage  to  so  many 
of  our  fathers,  who  have  long  awaited  this  ha2)piness." 
Indeed,  a  mission  among  the  Illinois  is  said  to  have 
been  decided  on,  and  he  was  already  studying  that  lan- 
guage when  the  station  at  St.  Esprit  was  broken  up  by 
the  Sioux,  and  the  unfortunate  Hurons  were  obliged  to 
resume  their  wanderings.  Following  his  flock  as  they 
retraced  their  steps  towards  the  east,  he  came  with 
them  to  the  Straits  of  Michilimackinac,  where,  tempted 
by  the  abundance  of  fish  and  the  facilities  of  trade,  they 
halted  and  fortified  themselves.  Here  he  built  a  log 
chapel  and  founded  the  mission  of  St.  Ignatius,  and 
here  he  passed  the  next  two  years  of  his  life  in  the 
faithful  discharge  of  the  round  of  duties  that  fell  to  his 
lot,  though  his  thoughts  seem  to  have  been  ever  turned 
towards  the  Mississippi.  Even  when  writing  hopefully 
of  his  work  among  the  Hurons,  as  he  did  in  1672,  he 
avows  his  willingness  "  to  give  it  up  and  go  to  seek  new 
nations  towards  the  south  sea  ...  to  teach  them  o£ 
our  Great  God,"  whenever  it  should  be  thought  advis- 
able for  him  to  do  so. 

Fortunately  he  had  not  long  to  wait,  for,  in  the  au- 
tunm  of  this  year,  Frontenac  became  governor ;  and  as 
he  was  a  man  of  ideas  as  well  as  of  action,  he  quickly 
saw  the  importance  of  the  scheme  which  he  had  inher- 
ited from  Talon  for  the  occupation  of  the  interior  of 
the  continent,  and  he  determined  to  carry  out  the  plan 
which  had  already  been  partially  formed  for  the  dis- 
covery and  exploration  of  the  Mississippi.  Joliet,  who 
had  been  educated  for  a  Jesuit,  but  who  was  now  a  fur- 
trader,  and  a  man  of  experience,  and  "  had  already 
been  near  the  great  river,"  was  chosen  for  the  work, 


8  MISSOURI. 

and  with  him  was  associated  Marquette,  the  saintly 
missionary  at  Point  St.  Ignatius,  or,  as  it  is  now  called, 
Mackinaw. 

Starting  on  his  journey  without  any  unnecessary  de- 
lay, Joliet  reached  the  mission  at  Mackinaw,  and  on 
the  8th  of  December,  the  festival  of  the  Immaculate 
Conception,  gave  Marquette  the  news  that  he  had  been 
assigned  to  the  expedition,  —  a  coincidence  which  the 
good  father  does  not  fail  to  notice.  During  the  next 
few  months,  the  explorers  busied  themselves  in  collect- 
ing what  information  they  could  as  to  their  route,  for 
they  were  determined  that  the  enterprise  "  should  not 
be  foolhardy,"  even  if  it  were  hazardous.  From  the 
accounts  given  by  the  Indians  "  who  had  frequented 
these  parts,"  they  were  able  to  trace  a  map  of  all  the 
new  country,  marking  down  the  rivers  on  which  they 
were  to  sail,  the  names  of  the  nations  and  places 
through  which  they  were  to  pass,  the  course  of  the  great 
river,  and  what  direction  they  were  to  take  when  they 
reached  it.  Everything  seems  to  have  been  done  coolly 
and  systematically,  and,  so  far  as  it  Avas  possible  to  see 
into  the  future,  nothing  was  left  to  chance.  With  the 
return  of  spring,  the  final  preparations  were  made  for 
the  journey,  "  the  duration  of  which,"  we  are  told, 
"  they  could  not  foresee."  This  did  not  take  them 
long,  for  their  outfit  was  simple,  consisting  merely  of 
two  birch  canoes  and  a  supply  of  Indian  corn  and  dried 
meat.  They  also  engaged  five  men  to  accompany  them  ; 
and  then,  having  put  their  voyage  under  the  protection 
of  the  Blessed  Virgin,  they  set  out  on  the  17th  of  May, 
1673,  "  firmly  resolved  to  do  all  and  suffer  all  for  so 
glorious  an  enterprise." 

Skirting  along   the    shores    of   Lake    Michigan   and 


DISCOVERY   OF   THE  M/SSISSJPPf.  9 

Green  Bay,  they  entered  Fox  River,  and  followed  it  up 
to  the  water-shed  which  divides  the  lakes  from  the 
Mississippi.  This  they  crossed,  and,  launching  their 
canoes  upon  the  Wisconsin,  they  paddled  down  stream 
"  for  a  distance  of  seventy  leagues,"  when,  on  the  17th 
of  June,  they  found  themselves  upon  the  broad  bosom  of 
the  Mississippi. 

Descending  with  the  current,  they  cautiously  felt  their 
way  along,  anchoring  at  night  at  some  distance  from 
the  shores.  In  a  few  simple  sentences  the  good  father 
describes  the  country  through  which  they  passed,  and 
the  different  kinds  of  animals  which  they  met.  Espe- 
cially was  he  struck  with  the  size  of  the  fish,  and  the 
appearance  of  the  buffaloes.  At  length,  on  the  25th, 
they  discovered  on  the  west  bank  of  the  river  footprints 
and  a  beaten  path  which  led  into  a  beautiful  prairie. 
Rightly  conjecturing  that  it  was  the  pathway  to  an  In- 
dian village,  they  followed  it  for  some  two  leagues, 
when  they  came  to  a  cluster  of  three  villages,  which,  to 
their  great  relief,  were  inhabited  by  bands  of  the  Illinois, 
the  very  tribe  which  Marquette  had  long  been  anxious 
to  visit.  Here  they  were  received  with  true  Indian  hos- 
pitality. A  feast  of  four  courses  was  duly  prepared, 
during  which  the  several  dishes  were  fed  to  them  as  if 
they  were  children.  They  were  also  treated  to  ftie 
"  calumet "  dance,  and,  what  was  more  to  the  point,  one 
of  these  mysterious  pipes  was  given  to  them  as  a  safe- 
guard, for  with  it  "  you  can  march  fearlessly  among 
enemies,  who,  even  in  the  heat  of  battle,  lay  down  their 
arms  when  it  is  shown." 

Resuming  their  journey,  they  coasted  along  the  Piasa 
bluffs,  on  which  were  painted  two  frightful  monsters  as 
large  as  calves,  "  wath  horns  on  the  head  like  a  deer,  a 


10  MISSOCRL 

fearful  look,  red  eyes,  bearded  like  a  tiger,  the  face  some- 
what like  a  man's,  the  body  covered  with  scales,  and  the 
tail  so  long  that  it  twice  makes  the  turn  of  the  body,  pass- 
ing over  the  head  and  down  between  the  legs,  and  ending 
at  last  in  a  fish's  tail."  These  figures  were  so  "  high  up  on 
the  rock  that  it  must  have  been  difficult  to  get  at  them 
in  order  to  paint  them,"  and  yet  the  work  is  said  to  have 
been  so  well  done  that  "  good  painters  in  France  would 
find  it  hai'd  to  do  as  well."  Green,  red,  and  black  were 
the  colors  used,  and  altogether  it  seems  to  have  been 
a  very  creditable  piece  of  savage  workmanship.  Hav- 
ing passed  this  fearful  spot,  "  on  which  the  boldest  In- 
dian dare  not  gaze  long,  and  whilst  still  talking  about 
it,"  they  came  to  the  mouth  of  the  Missouri.  From 
the  description  of  the  scene,  it  must  have  been  during 
the  spring  freshet,  and  any  one  who  has  ever  looked 
upon  the  junction  of  these  two  mighty  streams  at  such 
a  time  will  not  fail  to  appreciate  the  dangers  to  which 
our  explorers  were  now  exposed.  Luckily,  however, 
they  escaped,  and  holding  on  their  course  for  a  few  days 
longer  they  reached  the  mouth  of  the  Ohio,  or  Oua- 
boukigou,  on  which  the  Shawnees  are  said  to  have  had 
thirty-eight  villages. 

Soon  after  leaving  this  point,  and  whilst  floating  la- 
zily along,  scorched  by  the  sun  and  a  prey  to  the  mos- 
quitoes, they  were  startled  by  seeing  on  the  east  bank 
of  the  river  a  band  of  Indians,  who  were  armed  with 
guns,  wore  cloth  clothes,  and  had  hoes,  hatchets,  beads, 
and  other  things  which  had  evidently  been  obtained  from 
the  whites.  Marquette  now  displayed  the  calumet, 
which  was  at  once  recognized,  and  he  and  his  party  were 
invited  to  land  and  to  partake  of  a  feast,  at  which  they 
were    served    with    "  wild    beef,    bear's   oil,   and   wliite 


DISCOVERY   OF   THE   MISSISSIPPI.  11 

plums."  The  next  morning  they  again  set  out,  and  after 
a  monotonous  journey  of  some  days  they  came  to  a 
village  of  the  Mitchigamea,  which  was  situated  eight  or 
ten  leagues  ahove  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas.  Here,  for 
the  first  time,  they  met  with  what  promised  to  be  a  hos- 
tile reception.  The  war-whoop  was  sounded,  the  young 
warriors  crowded  to  the  attack,  and  one  of  them  threw 
his  war  club,  which  fortunately  missed  its  aim.  It 
was  a  critical  moment,  but  just  at  this  time  some  of 
the  old  men  appeared  upon  the  scene,  and,  recognizing 
the  peace-pipe  which  Marquette  held  aloft,  they  checked 
the  ardor  of  the  young  warriors  and  put  an  end  to  the 
threatened  conflict.  The  Frenchmen  were  now  invited  to 
land,  and  after  a  friendly  conference  and  the  usual  feast, 
they  passed  the  night  in  the  cabins  of  their  entertainers, 
but  "  not  without  some  uneasiness."  Embarking  again 
the  next  day,  they  reached  the  village  of  the  Arkansas 
("  Akamsea"),  which  was  situated  opposite  the  mouth  of 
the  river  of  that  name,  in  what  is  now  the  State  of 
Mississippi.  As  their  coming  had  been  announced,  they 
were  received  with  every  mark  of  honor.  A  feast  was 
given  them  which  seems  to  have  lasted  all  day,  and  at 
night  the  chief  danced  the  calumet  as  a  mark  of  perfect 
assurance,  and  then,  to  remove  all  fears,  he  presented 
one  of  these  pipes  to  Marquette. 

From  these  Indians  they  learned  that  they  were  ten 
days'  journey  from  the  sea,  and  that  the  lower  portion 
of  the  river  was  so  infested  by  hostile  tribes,  armed 
with  guns,  that  any  farther  progress  in  that  direction 
would  be  attended  with  great  danger.  Under  these  cir- 
cumstances, the  explorers  held  a  council  and  decided  to 
return.  They  had  gone  far  enough  to  satisfy  themselves 
that  the  Mississippi  emptied  into  the  Gulf  of  Mexico, 


12  MISSOURI. 

and  they  were  fearful  if  they  went  farther  of  heing  cap- 
tured by  the  Indians  or  Spaniards,  and  thus  losing  the 
fruits  of  their  labors.  Accordingly  on  the  17th  of  July 
they  set  out  on  their  homeward  vo^^age.  When  they 
reached  the  mouth  of  the  Illinois  they  determined  to  re- 
turn by  that  route  instead  of  by  the  way  by  which  they 
came.  This,  we  are  told,  shoi'tened  their  journey,  and 
brought  them  without  trouble  to  the  lake  of  the  Illinois, 
or,  as  it  is  now  called,  Michigan.  Coasting  along  its 
western  shores,  they  reached  the  mission  at  the  head  of 
Green  Bay  on  the  last  of  September,  having  been  gone 
just  four  months  and  traveled  over  twenty-five  hun- 
dred miles. 

Leaving  Marquette  here,  to  rest  and  recuperate,  Joliet 
pushed  on  to  Quebec.  When  near  Montreal,  and  al- 
most in  sight  of  his  destination,  his  canoe  was  upset,  and 
all  his  papers  were  lost.  It  was  a  serious  accident,  but 
fortunately  not  irreparable,  for  Marquette,  too,  had  kept 
a  journal  of  the  voyage ;  and  though  Joliet  made  a  short 
report  from  memory,  yet  it  is  to  the  narrative  of  the 
worthy  Jesuit  that  we  are  chiefly  indebted  for  what  we 
know  of  this  expedition.  In  the  map  which  accom- 
panies his  "  Relation,"  he  has  rudely  sketched  the  river 
system  of  the  valley  as  far  as  it  was  known  ;  and  in  his 
speculations  as  to  the  length  and  course  of  the  Missouri, 
and  his  familiarity  with  the  names  and  locations  of  some 
of  the  tribes  that  dwelt  upon  its  banks,  as  well  as  of 
those  that  lived  upon  the  Ohio,  he  gives  a  very  favor- 
able idea  of  the  extent  and  character  of  the  knowledge 
which,  even  at  this  early  day,  the  French  had  acquired 
of  the  geography  of  all  this  region. 

Important  as  were  the  results  of  this  expedition,  there 
was  yet  much  to  be  done  before  the  full  benefits  of  the 


DISCOVERY   OF   THE  MISSISSIPPI.  13 

discovery  could  be  reaped.  The  upper  and  lower  por- 
tions of  the  river  were  yet  to  be  explored,  and  when 
this  was  done  and  the  course  of  the  great  river  was 
known  tlirough  its  entire  length,  measures  would  still 
have  to  be  taken  for  the  occupation  of  the  country  through 
which  it  flowed.  This  was  a  vast  undertaking,  but  it 
was  of  a  character  that  was  suited  to  the  spirit  of  that 
age,  and  La  Salle,  who  "'  had  obtained  the  grant  of  Fort 
Frontenac,  the  monopoly  of  the  lake  trade,  and  a  patent 
of  nobility,"  now  set  out  to  accomplish  it.  He  was  a 
friend  if  not  a  partner  of  the  governor,  and  he  had 
rich  relatives  in  France  who  were  willing  to  assist  him, 
so  that  he  was  able  to  command  political  influence  and 
money,  or  its  equivalent,  credit.  Besides  these  essential 
requisites  he  was  endowed  with  certain  attributes  of 
mind  and  body,  and  was  possessed  of  a  measure  of  ex- 
perience that  fitted  him  for  the  work.  He  had  already, 
as  has  been  said,  discovered  the  Ohio,  and  probably  the 
Illinois  too ;  and  if  he  did  not  reach  the  Mississippi,  he 
certainly  knew  of  its  existence,  and  he  may  possibly 
have  identified  it  with  the  great  river  of  De  Soto.  At 
all  events,  he  seems  to  have  had  very  clear  ideas  as  to 
where  it  emptied  and  of  its  commercial  possibilities,  for 
he  had  obtained  a  monopoly  of  the  fur-trade  of  the  val- 
ley, and  contemplated  the  erection  of  forts  and  the  es- 
tablishment of  colonies  at  such  points  as  would  give  him 
the  control  of  this  trade  in  fact  as  well  as  in  name,  and 
thus  enable  him  to  establish  his  fortunes  upon  a  sure 
foundation. 

In  pursuance  of  this  plan,  he  led  an  expedition  to 
the  Illinois,  in  the  winter  of  1679-80,  and  built  a  fort 
on  that  stream,  just  below  Peoria  lake,  to  which  he  gave 
the  name  of  Creue-cceiir.     From  this  point  as   a  base, 


14  MISSOURI. 

he  dispatched  Father  Hennepin  to  explore  the  lower 
Illinois  and  the  upper  Mississippi,  whilst  he  himself  re- 
turned to  Fort  Frontenac,  now  Kingston,  in  order  to 
look  after  his  affairs,  which  had  fallen  into  confusion. 

After  some  delay,  growing  out  of  his  unwillingness  to 
undertake  the  expedition,  Hennepin  finally  set  out  on 
the  29th  of  February,  1680.  On  the  11th  of  April,  when 
near  the  mouth  of  the  Wisconsin,  he  was  captured  by  a 
party  of  Sioux,  who  adopted  him  into  the  tribe.  In  their 
company  he  visited  the  Falls  of  St.  Anthony,  which  he 
named  ;  and  with  them  he  remained  until  the  autumn 
of  that  year,  when  he  was  rescued  by  Du  Lhut.  During 
the  next  year,  and  without  having  seen  La  Salle,  or  made 
any  report  to  him,  the  tricky  friar  sailed  for  Europe. 
Soon  afterwards  he  published  a  narrative  of  his  journey, 
in  which  he  gave  a  description  of  the  river  above  the 
mouth  of  the  Wisconsin,  and  an  account  of  the  manners 
and  customs  of  the  Sioux.  This  is  the  only  publication 
he  ever  made  that  is  entitled  to  any  credence,  and  even 
in  this,  some  of  the  statements  are  to  be  taken  with  many 
grains  of  allowance.  In  the  edition  issued  some  years 
later,  he  involves  himself  in  such  a  net-work  of  false- 
hoods and  contradictions  as  to  cast  discredit  upon  the 
work  which  he  really  performed. 

In  the  niean  time  La  Salle,  having  restored  his  affairs 
to  something  like  order,  returned  to  the  Illinois,  only  to 
find  tbat,  during  the  absence  of  Tonti,  his  fort  had  been 
plundered  and  destroyed  by  his  own  men.  This  neces- 
sitated another  trip  to  Fort  Frontenac,  which  must  have 
been  made  in  1681,  for  in  December  of  that  year  he 
was,  once  again,  at  the  head  of  Lake  Michigan,  accom- 
panied by  Tonti,  Father  Membre,  and  some  others,  who 
had  been  faithful  to  him  during  his  adverse  fortunes, 


DISCOVERY    OF   THE  MISSISSIPPI.  15 

and  who  were  now  to  share  with  him  in  the  glory  of  his 
discovery.  Inchiding  these  faithful  friends  and  follow- 
ers, the  party  which  he  had  made  up  for  the  descent  of 
the  Mississipi^i  consisted  of  twenty-three  Frenchmen 
and  thirty-one  Indians,  of  whom  ten  were  women  and 
three  children. 

Loading  their  canoes  upon  sledges,  they  dragged  them 
across  the  portage  and  down  the  frozen  Illinois  to  the 
foot  of  Peoria  lake,  where  they  found  open  water.  Here 
they  embarked,  and  after  a  somewhat  uneventful  voyage 
they  reached  the  Mississippi  on  the  6th  of  February, 
1682,  and  the  Gulf  on  the  9th  of  the  following  April. 
Having  found  a  suitable  spot  La  Salle  erected  a  cross, 
raised  the  arms  of  France,  and,  in  a  proces  verbal,  which 
was  duly  witnessed,  he  took  possession  of  all  the  region 
watered  by  the  Mississippi  and  its  tributaries,  and  he 
named  it  Louisiana,  in  honor  of  his  sovereign,  Louis 
XIV.,  by  the  grace  of  God  King  of  France  and  Na- 
varre. 

The  work  of  exploration  was  now  complete,  but  the 
more  difficult  task  of  occupation  still  remained,  and  to 
this  La  Salle  now  devoted  all  his  energies.  Returning 
to  the  Illinois  he  dispatched  Father  Membre  to  Europe, 
with  the  news  of  his  discovery,  whilst  he  himself  built  a 
fort  on  Starved  Rock,  —  a  bluff  near  where  the  town  of 
Ottawa  now  stands,  —  which  he  intended  to  serve  as  a 
centre  of  trade  and  a  place  of  refuge  against  the  inroads 
of  the  Iroquois.  Around  this  point  he  speedily  gathered 
a  large  colony,  consisting  of  a  score  of  Frenchmen,  to 
whom  he  made  grants  of  lands,  and  of  some  thousands 
of  Indians,  belonging  to  different  tribes,  who  were  drawn 
thither  by  the  prospects  of  trade,  and  by  the  promise  of 
protection  which  the  fort  afforded. 


16  MISSOURI. 

Leaving  Tonti  in  command  of  this  motley  crowd, 
La  Salle,  in  the  autumn  of  1683,  sailed  for  France, 
where  his  presence  was  sadly  needed.  His  friend  and 
partner,  Frontenac,  was  no  longer  governor,  and  La  Barre, 
who  was  now  at  the  head  of  affairs,  had  identified  him- 
self with  his  enemies,  and  did  not  hesitate  at  any  meas- 
ures that  were  necessary  to  effect  his  ruin.  Fort  Fron- 
tenac was  seized  on  the  ground  that  he  had  not  com- 
plied with  the  conditions  upon  which  it  had  been  granted 
to  him ;  his  men  were  prevented  from  obtaining  sup- 
plies ;  the  Iroquois  were  told  that  they  might  rob  and 
kill  him  with  impunity  ;  and  an  officer  was  sent  out  to 
take  possession  of  the  fort  which  he  had  built  on  the 
Illinois.  Such  was  the  condition  of  affairs  when  he  left 
for  Europe,  and  it  must  be  confessed  that  the  outlook 
was  anything  but  encouraging.  He  was  in  debt,  and  as 
all  his  property  had  been  seized,  and  much  of  it  wasted, 
there  seemed  to  be  no  way  by  which  he  could  extricate 
himself.  La  Salle,  however,  was  not  a  person  to  be 
daunted  by  difficulties.  Proceeding  to  Paris,  he  laid  his 
case  before  the  colonial  minister,  and,  fortunately  for 
himself,  he  found  in  that  officer  a  warm  advocate. 
Frontenac,  too,  was  again  in  favor,  and  by  the  aid  of 
these  two  powerful  friends  he  soon  succeeded  in  re- 
establishing his  affairs  upon  a  firm  basis.  Not  only 
were  his  forts  restored,  but  La  Barre  was  ordered  to 
make  reparation  for  the  injury  which  had  been  done 
him,  and  means  were  fin-nished  him  for  establishing  a 
post  and  colony  near  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi. 

In  a  memorial  which  he  prepared  at  this  time  for  the 
use  of  the  king,  he  gave  a  brief  statement  of  what  he 
had  already  accomplished ;  set  forth  his  views  and 
plans  at  some  length  ;  and  dreAV  such  a  flattering  pic- 


DISCOVERY   OF   THE   M/SS/SS/FPI.  17 

ture  of  the  niilitaiy  possibilities  of  the  proposed  colony 
in  the  event  of  a  war  with  Spain,  that  the  king  granted 
him  all  the  supplies  that  were  asked  for.  Soldiers,  of 
whom  Father  Le  Clerc  did  not  have  a  very  high  opinion, 
were  recruited  for  the  expedition,  as  were  "  three  or 
four  mechanics  in  each  trade,"  who  were  subsequently 
found  to  know  nothing  at  all  about  their  several  occupa- 
tions. Some  eight  or  ten  families  of  good  people  vol- 
unteered to  go,  as  did  a  number  of  girls,  who  were 
"  allured  by  the  prospect  of  certain  marriage."  A  full 
complement  of  priests,  too,  was  added,  among  whom 
were  La  Salle's  brother  —  the  Sulpitian,  Cavelier  — 
and  the  Recollet  Friars  Membr^,  Douay,  and  Le  Clerc. 
At  length,  all  things  being  ready,  the  expedition  sailed 
from  Rochelle  on  the  24th  of  July,  1684,  and,  after  a 
series  of  misfortunes  which  seem  to  have  attended  them 
from  the  beginning  of  the  voyage,  they  reached  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  sighted  land  on  the  28th  of  De- 
cember. By  accident,  or  owing  to  ignorance,  or  jios- 
sibly,  as  Joutel  suggests,  to  treachery,  they  passed  the 
mouths  of  the  Mississippi,  and  coasted  along  in  an  aim- 
less sort  of  way  until  about  the  middle  of  February, 
1685;  the  colonists  were  finally  landed  on  the  shores  of 
Matagorda  Bay,  which  La  Salle  had  wrongly  supposed 
to  be  one  of  the  outlets  of  the  great  river.  Here  he 
built  a  fort ;  and,  having  satisfied  himself  that  he  was 
too  far  westward,  he  started  out  to  find  the  Mississippi, 
for  lie  knew  well  that  until  it  was  found,  and  the  colony 
was  safely  transferred  to  its  banks,  all  his  expenditure 
of  time,  labor,  and  money  had  been  in  vain.  The  effort, 
however,  was  not  attended  with  success,  and  equally 
futile  was  a  second  attempt  made  in  the  following 
year  (1686). 


18  MISSOURI. 

Meanwhile,  the  affairs  of  the  colony  had  been  going 
from  bad  to  worse.  In  addition  to  other  misfortunes, 
disease  and  death  had  been  busy  among  them.  "  Out  of 
one  hundred  and  eighty  colonists  less  than  forty-five 
remained,"  and  they  were  weighed  down  by  gloomy 
forebodings  as  to  the  future.  It  was  no  longer  a  ques- 
tion of  the  success  of  the  expedition,  but  a  matter  of  life 
and  death  to  the  few  colonists  who  were  left.  In  this 
extremity,  La  Salle  determined  to  go  to  his  fort  on  the 
Illinois,  the  nearest  point  from  which  he  could  expect 
assistance.  It  was  a  hazardous  undertaking;  but  it 
was  the  best  thing  that  could  be  done.  After  a  pain- 
ful parting,  "  which  all  felt  was  to  be  their  last,"  he  set 
out  on  the  17th  of  January,  1687,  and,  on  the  19th  of 
March,  he,  together  with  one  of  his  nephews,  his  ser- 
vant, and  his  faithful  Shawnee  hunter,  Nika,  was  mur- 
dered by  some  of  his  own  men.  Upon  his  death,  the 
murderers  took  control  of  the  party,  and  for  a  while 
they  carried  matters  with  a  high  hand.  In  a  short  time 
they  quarreled  over  a  division  of  the  property,  and,  by 
a  sort  of  retributive  justice,  the  two  principal  criminals 
were  in  their  turn  killed  by  their  accomplice^.  The 
party  now  divided.  Joutel,  the  two  Caveliers,  and  Fa- 
ther Douay,  who  had  all  been  true  to  their  leader, 
pushed  on,  and,  at  the  end  of  two  months,  they  reached 
the  post  which  Tonti  had  established  the  year  previous 
at  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas.  From  here  they  pro- 
ceeded by  relatively  easy  marches  to  the  fort  on  the  Illi- 
nois, where  they  were  well  cared  for  by  the  faithful  Tonti, 
to  whom  they  falsely  represented  that  La  Salle  was  alive 
and  in  good  health,  and  from  whom  they  borrowed  the 
money  necessary  to  continue  their  journey.  A  few 
months  later  he  learned  the  truth  about  La  Salle,  where- 


DISCOVERY   OF   THE   MlSS/SSIPPf.  19 

upon  he  again  descended  the  river  in  the  hope  of  being 
able  to  render  some  assistance  to  the  colonists  who  had 
been  left  at  the  fort  on  IMatagorda  Bay.  In  this  gen- 
erous effort  he  was  doomed  to  disappointment.  When  on 
Red  River  he  was  deserted  by  six  out  of  the  eight  men 
who  were  with  him  ;  and  though  he  kept  on  for  some 
time  longer,  he  was  obliged  in  the  end  to  give  up  the 
undertaking,  owing  to  the  accidental  loss  of  all  his  am- 
munition, and  to  the  refusal  of  the  Indians,  among 
whom  he  then  was,  to  furnish  him  with  guides.  Under 
these  circumstances  he  decided  to  retrace  his  steps ;  and, 
after  a  journey  in  which  he  suffered  great  hardships, 
he  reached  the  Arkansas  in  July,  1689,  and  the  fort  on 
the  Illinois  in  September  of  the  same  year. 

Disastrous  as  was  this  attemj^t  at  colonizing  the  lower 
Mississippi,  it  did  not  long  delay  that  event.  The  situ- 
ation was  too  important,  considered  either  strategically 
or  commercially,  to  be  overlooked  ;  and,  as  La  Salle 
had  foretold,  both  the  English  and  Spaniards  stood 
ready  to  seize  it,  or  to  occupy  such  positions  along  the 
coast  as  would  enable  them  to  neutralize  any  advantage 
which  the  French  might  hope  to  gain  from  its  posses- 
sion. Indeed,  with  this  end  in  view,  the  Spaniards  are 
said  to  have  fortified  Pensacola  as  early  as  1696,  and 
some  three  years  later  an  English  expedition  ascended 
the  Mississippi,  but  was  turned  back  by  a  stratagem  of 
the  French,  who  had  anticipated  their  arrival  by  only  a 
few  months.  These  designs  on  the  part  of  their  rivals 
were  well  known  to  the  French,  and  caused  them  to 
hasten  the  preparations  they  were  making  for  the  occu- 
pation of  the  mouth  of  the  river.  Accordingly,  in  1698, 
the  Canadian,  Iberville,  was  sent  out  in  command  of  an 
expedition,  and,  after  a  successful  voyage,  he  landed  at 


20  MISSOURI. 

old  Biloxi  in  February  of  tlie  following  year  and  built 
a  fort.  From  this  point  the  neighboring  coast  and  the 
lower  portion  of  the  river  were  explored  ;  and  it  was 
during  one  of  these  expeditions  that  Bienville  was 
handed  the  letter  which,  fourteen  years  before,  Tonti 
had  left  for  La  Salle.  Other  points  were  occupied  in 
due  time,  and  soon  traders  and  missionaries  began  to 
ascend  and  descend  the  river.  The  journey,  however, 
was  not  always  free  from  danger,  as  there  were  times 
when,  owing  to  the  intrigues  of  English  traders  and 
other  causes,  tribes,  like  the  Chickasaws  and  Natchez, 
dug  up  the  hatchet  and  "  barred  "  the  river.  As  a 
rule,  though,  these  occasions  were  rare ;  and  the  jour- 
ney was  made  without  other  dangers  and  discomforts 
than  those  of  the  river  and  climate.  By  superior  man- 
agement the  French  were  able  to  counteract  the  influ- 
ence of  the  English  with  the  river  tribes,  and  for  fifty 
years  and  more  —  from  the  settlement  in  1699  until  the 
cession  to  Spain  in  1762 — the  Mississippi  was  to  all 
intents  and  purposes  a  French  river. 


CHAPTER  II. 

FRENCH    DOMINATION    IN    THE    MISSISSIPPI   VALLEY. 

During  the  whole  of  the  period  that  the  French  held 
the  control  of  the  valley,  Missouri,  as  such,  had  no  sep- 
arate legal  existence  and  not  a  single  settlement  that 
has  proved  to  be  permanent,  except,  perhaps,  Ste.  Gene- 
vieve. Exactly  when  the  "  old  "  village  of  this  name 
was  founded  is  a  matter  that  cannot  be  positively  deter- 
mined ;  and  it  is  not  Important  that  it  should  be,  except 
in  so  far  as  it  may  serve  to  throw  light  upon  the  time 
when  the  French  began  to  familiarize  themselves  with 
the  resources  of  the  region  west  of  the  Mississippi. 
Upon  this  point  the  testimony  of  Penicaut  is  of  interest. 
He  arrived  in  lower  Louisiana  in  1699,  and  in  1700  he 
made  one  of  the  party  that  ascended  the  river  with  Le 
Sueur  for  the  purpose  of  opening  a  copper  mine  which 
was  supposed  to  be  on  one  of  the  tributaries  of  the 
Minnesota.  In  the  journal  which  he  kept  of  that  expe- 
dition, he  refers  to  the  salt  licks  near  Ste.  Genevieve,  and 
says  that  they  were  resorted  to  by  the  French  and  In- 
dians, and  that  "  presently  "  there  was  a  settlement  of 
the  French  at  that  place.  He  also  speaks  of  a  mine  sit- 
uated fifty  leagues  west  of  the  Mississippi,  from  which 
the  Indians  got  their  supply  of  lead,  and  to  which  they 
went  by  way  of  the  Maramec.  These  statements  are 
explicit ;  they  are  borne  oixt  by  the  facts  as  they  now 
exist,  and  if  they  do  not  fix  the  precise  date  when  Ste. 


22  jvissouiij. 

Genevieve  was  first  settled,  they  at  least  justify  the  in- 
ference that  it  w^as  shortly  after  the  arrival  of  the  French 
at  the  village  of  Kaskaskia,  on  the  other  side  of  the 
river,  and  hence,  that  it  must  have  heen  early  in  the 
eighteenth  century,  and  not  about  the  middle,  as  some- 
times supposed.  They  also  indicate,  with  reasonable  cer- 
tainty, the  date  wben  the  French  began  to  make  use  of 
the  mineral  and  other  natural  resources  in  \^d^ich  the 
region  lying  between  the  Mississippi  and  the  Maramec 
abounded. 

From  this  time  forward,  the  career  of  the  French  in 
"  the  Illinois,"  as  this  portion  of  the  colony  was  called, 
can  be  easily  traced.  At  first,  and  for  a  quarter  of  a 
century  or  moi'e,  it  would  seem  as  if  they  must  have  been 
given  over  almost  altogether  to  the  search  after  silver 
and  copper.  At  all  events,  this  is  the  not  unnatural  in- 
ference from  the  prominence  accorded  to  this  pursuit, 
in  all  the  official  documents.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  how- 
ever, there  are  two  sides  to  the  shield,  though  there  can 
be  no  question  that,  so  far  as  it  was  possible  for  the  home 
authorities  to  make  it  so,  the  search  for  silver  was,  for  a 
number  of  years,  the  controlling  interest  in  the  little  col- 
ony. As  early  as  1703,  a  party  of  twenty  set  out  to  go 
from  Kaskaskia  to  New  Mexico,  by  way  of  the  Missouri 
River,  for  the  purpose  of  ...  "  visiting  certain  mines 
which  were  said,  by  the  Indians,  to  yield  a  kind  of  lead 
that  was  white  and  of  no  account  because  it  did  not 
melt  in  the  fire,"  as  did  the  true  lead  found  nearer 
home.  Of  the  fate  of  this  expedition  nothing  is  known, 
but  the  feasibility  of  the  journey  is  placed  beyond 
doubt  by  the  fact  that,  in  1714,  specimens  of  silver 
were  forwarded  to  La  Mothe  Cadillac,  at  Mobile,  and 
the  report  that  they  had  been  taken  from  mines  near 


FRENCH  DOMINATION.  23 

Kaskaskia  brought  that  official  up  the  river  only  to  find 
that  he  had  been  deceived,  and  that  the  specimens 
had  really  come  from  Mexico.  In  spite  of  disappoint- 
ments like  these,  and  of  the  fact  that  thus  far  not  a 
jiarticle  of  silver  had  been  found  in  this  region,  the  co- 
lonial authorities  were  satisfied  that  it  would  ultimately 
be  discovered,  and  they  ascribed  the  failure  to  find  it 
to  the  want  of  skill  on  the  part  of  their  agents. 

Impressed  with  this  belief,  the  directors  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi Company,  who  had  come  into  the  possession  of 
the  charter  of  the  colony  after  its  relinquishment  by 
Crozat,  in  1717,  sent  out  several  parties  composed  of 
men  who  were  supposed  to  be  accustomed  to  this  kind 
of  work,  though  Charlevoix,  for  reasons  that  appear  to 
be  good  and  sufficient,  doubts  their  capacity.  Among 
the  first  to  arrive  was  the  Sieur  de  Lochon,  who  came 
out  in  1719.  He  "  dug  in  a  place  that  was  showed  him, 
took  up  a  pretty  large  quantity  of  the  mineral,  a  pound 
of  which,  that  took  up  four  days  to  melt,  produced,  as 
they  say,  two  drachms  of  silver ;  but  some  persons  sus- 
pect that  he  put  in  the  silver."  A  few  months  later 
he  tried  for  lead,  "  and  from  two  or  three  thousand 
weight  of  the  mineral  he  extracted  fourteen  pounds  of 
very  bad  lead,  which  cost  him  1,400  livres."  Dishear- 
tened by  this  failure,  he  gave  up  the  work  and  returned 
to  France.  Other  parties  followed  in  quick  succession, 
but  met  with  no  better  success.  They  found  no  silver, 
or,  if  they  did,  they  put  it  into  the  melting  pots  them- 
selves ;  and  though  lead  was  abundant,  yet  they  got  but 
little,  for  the  reason  that  "  they  did  not  know  how  to 
construct  their  furnaces."  Finally,  in  1720,  there  came 
the  Sieur  Renaud,  one  of  the  directors  of  the  company, 
who  is  said  to  have  surveyed  these  Maramec  mines  very 


24  MISSOURI. 

thorouglily.  He  fared  no  better  in  the  search  for  sil- 
ver than  did  his  predecessors,  and  his  errand  here  would 
not  call  for  further  comment  but  for  the  fact  that,  in 
1723,  the  earliest  grants  of  lands  in  what  is  now  known 
as  the  State  of  Missouri  were  made  to  him,  and  because, 
either  directly  or  indirectly,  he  was  the  means  of  intro- 
ducing negro  slavery  into  this  portion  of  the  colony. 
According  to  the  chronicles  of  the  day,  there  came  with 
him  "many  families  who  had  received  concessions  of 
lands  in  the  neighborhood  of  Kaskaskia,  and  who  brought 
with  them  a  number  of  negroes,  granted  to  them  by 
Bienville,  for  the  purpose  of  cultivating  these  lands." 
After  this  we  hear  but  little  of  silver,  though  as  late 
as  1744  Vaudreuil  forwarded  to  France  certain  speci- 
mens of  copper,  wliich  were  said  to  have  been  found  in 
the  district  of  the  Illinois.  The  lead  mines  of  this  re- 
gion, however,  were  steadUy  worked,  and  among  the 
articles  sent  down  the  river,  lead  was  not  the  least  im- 
portant. 

But  whilst  the  authorities  at  New  Orleans  and  Paris 
were  dreaming  of  silver  mines  and  squandering  large 
sums  of  money  in  a  vain  search  for  them,  the  colonists 
in  this  district,  consisting  almost  entirely  of  emigrants 
from  Canada,  were  quietly  pursuing  the  even  tenor  of 
their  way,  and  devoting  more  or  less  of  their  atten- 
tion to  the  trade  in  furs,  and  to  the  more  prosaic  but 
not  less  useful  business  of  farming.  Besides  the  ex- 
pedition up  the  Missouri,  to  which  reference  has  already 
been  made,  they  explored  the  Des  Moines  and  the 
Osage,  and  penetrated  into  Kansas  among  the  Panis, 
where  Dutign^,  in  1719,  planted  the  arms  of  France. 
This  steady  progress  westward  excited  the  jealousy  of 
the  Spaniards,  and,  in  1720,  they  fitted  out  an  expedition 


FRENCH   DOMINATION.  2,^ 

for  the  purpose  of  taking  a  position  on  the  Missouri 
which  woukl  enable  them  to  check  the  advance  of  the 
French  in  this  direction,  and  divert  the  trade  of  the 
Indians  from  Kaskaskia  to  Santa  Fe.  In  this  they  were 
unsuccessful,  as  the  expedition  fell  among  hostile  tribes 
and  was  destroyed. 

Alarmed  by  the  boldness  of  this  expedition,  and  with 
the  view  of  guarding  against  future  danger  from  this 
quarter,  as  well  as  in  the  expectation  of  extending 
their  trade,  the  French  sent  a  force  up  the  Missouri, 
and  built  a  fort  near  a  village  of  the  tribe  of  that 
name,  which  they  called  Fort  Orleans.^  At  the  date  of 
their  arrival  here,  a  general  war  was  raging  between  the 
Padoucas  on  one  side,  and  the  Missouris,  Osages,  lowas, 
Pawnees,  Ottos,  Mahas,  etc.,  on  the  other.  As  these 
last  were  all  friends  of  the  French,  and  the  war  inter- 
fered very  seriously  with  the  trade  in  "  buffalo's  wool,"  it 
became  a  matter  of  the  first  importance  to  bring  about  a 
peace  between  these  tribes.  Accordingly,  M.  de  Bourg- 
mont,  the  commandant  of  Fort  Orleans,  summoned 
them  to  meet  him  at  a  council  which  was  held  in  1724, 
at  a  ])oint  situated  on  one  of  the  western  tributaries  of 
the  Kansas,  when  and  where  the  pipe  was  smoked,  and 
a  general  peace  was  concluded.  Soon  after  this,  Fort 
Orleans  was  destroyed  and  the  garrison  massacred, 
probably  by  the  Missouris,  though  upon  this  point  there 
is  room  for  doubt.  Bossu,  however,  ascribes  it  to  them, 
and  intimates  that  the  outbreak  was  due  to  the  fx'auds 
practiced  upon  them  in  the  way  of  trade,  and  to  the 
fact  that  the  French  debauched  their  women. 

^  Du  Pratz  says  this  fort  was  on  an  island  opposite  the  village  of 
the  Missouris.  Tliere  is  reason,  however,  to  believe  that  it  may 
have  been  on  the  south  side  of  the  river,  fifteen  or  twenty  miles 
above  the  mouth  of  Grand  River.     Margry,  vi.  p.  393. 


26  MissouRr. 

These  were  the  only  occasions,  during  the  rule  of  the 
French,  upon  which  the  settlers  in  this  portion  of  the 
colony  were  exposed  to  serious  danger,  though  they 
hore  their  share  of  the  loss  entailed  hy  Bienville's  un- 
successful war  with  the  Chickasaws,  and  took  a  promi- 
nent part  in  the  fighting  which  began  about  the  middle 
of  the  century,  on  the  head  waters  of  the  Ohio,  and  ended 
in  the  treaty  of  Paris,  February,  1763,  and  the  expul- 
sion of  the  French  from  the  North  American  continent. 

During  all  these  years  the  little  settlement  on  the  Illi- 
nois, left  in  a  great  measure  to  itself,  and  sejiarated  by 
a  thousand  miles  and  more  from  the  intrigues  and  ex- 
actions that  prevailed  at  Quebec  and  New  Orleans,  con- 
tinued to  grow  slowly  but  steadily  in  population  and 
prospei'ity.  Besides  the  fur-trade  which  now  extended 
some  three  or  four  hundred  leagues  uji  the  Missouri, 
and  the  lead  mines  of  the  Maramec  from  which  the 
yield  was,  practically,  unlimited,  the  agricultural  pro- 
ducts of  the  district  began  to  assume  important  propor- 
tions. From  the  first  arrival  of  the  French  in  this 
quarter,  they  had  given  more  or  less  of  their  attention 
to  the  cultivation  of  the  soil,  and  it  was  owing  to  this 
fact  that  they  were  exempt  from  the  oft  recurring  sea- 
sons of  scarcity  to  which  the  inhabitants  of  New  Orleans 
and  the  settlers  on  the  Gulf  coast  were  subject.  As 
early  as  1721,  Charlevoix,  writing  from  Kaskaskia,  says 
that  the  French  in  that  neighborhood  were  living  "  pretty 
much  at  their  ease."  They  cultivated  wheat  and  corn, 
and  had  domestic  cattle  and  fowls.  The  Indians,  too, 
whose  villages  adjoined  the  settlements  of  the  French, 
were  "  very  laborious,  and  cultivated  their  fields  in 
their  own  fashion."  A  few  years  later,  the  farm  ])rod- 
ucts  of  this  "  district  "  had  increased  to  such  an  extent 


FRENCH   DOMINATION.  27 

that  they  constituted  a  regular  article  of  shipment.  Le 
Page  du  Pratz  and  Bossu  both  speak  of  the  amount  of 
flour  which  was  sent  to  New  Orleans,  and  Vaudreuil 
who,  in  1743,  succeeded  Bienville  as  governor,  and  who 
was  not  a  partial  witness,  in  a  letter  to  the  minister,  says 
that  every  year,  in  the  latter  part  of  December,  there 
came  from  "the  Illinois"  boats  loaded  with  "flour,  corn, 
bacon  hams,  both  of  bear  and  hog,  corned  pork  and 
wild  beef,  myrtle  and  beeswax,  cotton,  tallow,  leather, 
tobacco,  lead,  copper,  buffalo-wool,  venison,  poultry, 
bear's  grease,  oil,  skins,  fowls,  and  hides."  Varied  as 
is  this  list,  it  is  not  complete,  for  Captain  Pittman,  who 
traveled  up  the  river  soon  after  the  eastern  portion  of 
the  valley  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  English,  adds  "  beer 
and  wines."  This  is  certainly  a  very  creditable  show- 
ing, and  furnishes  good  grounds  for  doubting  Vaudreull's 
sincerity,  when  he  seeks  to  justify  his  grant  to  Deruis- 
seau  of  the  monopoly  of  the  fur-trade  of  the  Missouri, 
by  saying  that  the  only  way  in  which  he  could  make  the 
people  in  this  part  of  the  colony  abandon  their  wander- 
ing mode  of  life  and  settle  down  to  farm  work,  was  by 
preventing  them  from  trading  with  the  Indians,  and  by 
prohibiting  them  from  acquiring  any  more  negro  slaves. 
The  two  statements,  to  say  the  least,  do  not  harmonize. 
A  wandering  life  is  never  compatible  with  the  success- 
ful employment  of  slave  labor,  and  the  fact  that,  in  1745, 
the  negroes  in  this  district  were  half  as  many  as  the 
whites,  is  not  only  conclusive  as  to  the  profitable  use  of 
this  form  of  labor,  but  it  is  equally  decisive  as  to  the 
manner  of  life  of  the  owners  of  these  slaves,  even  with- 
out the  confirmatory  evidence  of  the  products  which 
they  annually  sent  down  the  river. 

Notwithstanding    the    measure    of   success  which  at- 


28  MISSOURI. 

tended  this  comer  of  the  colony,  Louisiana,  taken  as 
a  whole,  and  regarded,  as  colonies  then  were,  simply 
as  a  mercantile  venture,  was  a  decided  failure.  So 
far  from  returning  a  profit  upon  the  sums  expended, 
there  never  was  a  time  when  it  was  self-supporting. 
Under  the  system  of  restrictions  upon  trade  and  produc- 
tion which  prevailed,  and  which  embodied  the  highest 
commercial  wisdom  of  the  day,  the  colonists  were  vir- 
tually prohibited  from  producing  anything  that  could 
be  obtained  from  the  mother  country.  They  were 
taught  to  look  to  France  even  for  their  food.  As  a  con- 
sequence, on  more  than  one  occasion  when  the  supplies 
failed  to  arrive,  the  settlers  on  the  lower  Mississippi 
and  along  the  Gulf  coast  were  reduced  to  such  straits 
that  they  were  obliged  to  quarter  themselves  upon 
the  neighboring  Indians,  in  order  to  escape  starvation. 
As  late  as  1741,  owing  to  the  destruction  by  a  storm 
of  the  warehouse  in  which  their  provisions  were  stored, 
the  inhabitants  of  Mobile  and  of  some  other  places  in 
that  part  of  the  colony  were  threatened  with  a  famine  ; 
and  the  dispatches  of  that  day  and  even  those  of  a  much 
later  date  are  filled  with  pitiful  appeals  to  France  for 
aid.  Of  course,  so  long  as  those  who  held  the  franchise 
of  the  colony,  no  matter  whether  it  was  the  state,  a  com- 
pany, or  an  individual,  were  able  and  willing  to  furnish 
the  necessary  supjilies  and  make  good  the  yearly  deficit 
in  men  and  money,  it  was  easy  enough  to  counteract  the 
evil  effects  engendered  by  the  attempt  to  put  into  prac- 
tice the  false  theories  upon  which  the  enterprise  was 
n-anaged.  It  was  even  possible,  provided  the  expendi- 
tu,res  were  upon  a  sufficiently  lavish  scale,  to  give  the 
settlement  an  appearance  of  prosperity,  as  was  the  case 
with  Louisiana  from  1717  to  1731,  when  the  Mississippi 


FRENCH  DOMINATION.  29 

Company  held  the  charter.  But  when  the  time  came, 
as  sooner  or  later  it  did,  that  the  supplies  were  either 
cut  down  or  withheld  altogether,  or  when  from  any 
cause  they  became  irregular  and  uncertain,  the  sem- 
blance of  prosperity  disappeared,  and  the  fatal  effects  of 
this  false  system  of  management,  in  the  shape  of  want 
and  its  attendant  train  of  evils,  began  at  once  to  make 
themselves  felt. 

Such  in  bi'ief  was  the  history  of  Louisiana  under 
French  domination.  Its  most  prosperous  period  was 
during  the  fourteen  years  that  the  Company  of  the 
Indies,  or,  as  it  was  also  called,  the  Mississippi  Com- 
pany, controlled  its  destinies,  and  its  prosperity  then,  as 
has  been  already  intimated,  was  not  a  healthy  growth, 
but  was  the  result  of  the  lavish  manner  in  which  sup- 
plies of  men  and  money  were  poured  into  the  colony 
from  abroad.  Some  idea  of  the  rate  at  which  this  was 
done  may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  that,  during  this 
time,  the  expenses  of  the  colony  are  said  to  have  been 
upwards  of  twenty  million  livres,  and  that  the  popula- 
tion was  swollen  from  seven  hundred  to  seven  thousand, 
of  which  number  two  thousand  were  negro  slaves. 

After  the  surrender  of  the  charter  to  the  king,  in  1731, 
the  regular  expenses  of  the  colony  were  reduced  to  a 
fraction  of  what  they  had  been  during  the  extravagant 
days  of  the  company,  and  the  population,  no  longer  fed 
by  arrivals  from  abroad,  gradually  fell  off,  until,  in 
1745,  the  number  of  inhabitants  was  only  about  six 
thousand,  of  whom  four  thousand  were  whites.  Com- 
pared with  the  previous  census,  this  shows  a  decrease  of 
one  thousand  whites,  the  number  of  negroes  remaining 
the  same.  In  all  probability  this  loss  was  afterwards 
made  good,  and  it  is  possible  that  the  number  of  whites 


30  MISSOURI. 

may  have  been  slightly  increased  over  what  it  was  in 
the  palmy  days  of  the  company,  but  not  to  the  extent 
claimed  by  Redan  de  Rassac.  According  to  him, 
Louisiana,  in  1763,  at  the  date  of  the  treaty  of  Paris, 
contained  "  three  thousand  French  families."  Allowing 
four  persons  to  each  family,  —  a  liberal  allowance,  if 
we  are  to  credit  the  statement  as  to  the  age  of  many  of 
the  married  women,  —  it  would  give  a  total  white  pop- 
ulation of  twelve  thousand,  which  is  believed  to  be  nuich 
too  large,  as  it  is  more  than  twice  as  many  as  were 
living  in  Spanish  Louisiana  in  1766,^  when  probably 
four  fifths  of  all  the  inhabitants  of  the  colony  were  on 
that  side  of  the  river. 

However,  be  this  as  it  may,  there  can  be  no  question 
that,  excluding  the  years  in  which  the  budget  was  swol- 
len by  the  payment  of  obligations  incurred  in  prosecut- 
ing the  Chickasaw  war,  there  was  a  marked  increase  in 
the  regular  annual  expenses  from  1731  until  the  cession 
to  Spain  in  1762.  Thus,  for  instance,  in  1740,  the  ex- 
penditures were  310,000  livres ;  in  1747  they  had  in- 
creased to  539,000  ;  and  during  the  years  1754-56  and 
1759  the  average  was  at  the  rate  of  800,000  livres  per 
annum.  Probably  during  the  whole  of  the  time  that 
Louisiana  was  a  dependency  of  the  crown,  it  had  cost 
not  less  than  from  forty  to  fifty  millions  of  livres  (eight 
to  ten  millions  of  dollars),  and  this,  of  course,  inde- 
pendent of  the  amount  paid  out  by  Crozat,  and  of  the 
twenty  million  livres  which  the  Mississippi  Conijiany  is 
said  to  have  wasted. 

This  was  a  heavy  price  to  pay  for  what  had  thus  far 

^  "It  had  ...  in  all,  five  thousand  five  hundred  and  fifty-six 
white  inhabitants.  The  blacks  were  nearly  as  numerous."  Mar- 
tin's History  of  Louisiana,  vol.  i.  p.  354.     New  Orleans,  1827. 


FRENCH   DOMINATION.  81 

proved  to  be  but  an  eni])ty  honor,  and,  in  the  present 
exhausted  condition  of  France,  it  must  soon  have  be- 
come a  serious  burden.  But  even  if  this  had  not  been 
the  case,  and  the  French  king  had  been  as  able,  as  he 
seems  to  have  been  willing,  to  preserve  his  American 
possessions,  it  was  no  longer  possible  for  him  to  do  so. 
The  fortunes  of  war  were  against  him.  Canada  had 
fallen ;  and,  with  Havana  in  the  hands  of  the  English, 
and  their  ships  riding  triumphant  on  the  ocean,  Louis- 
iana was  at  their  mercy.  Under  these  circumstances, 
his  most  Christian  majesty  made  a  virtue  of  necessity, 
and,  in  November,  1762,  he  transferred  the  whole  of 
that  colony  to  the  king  of  Spain.  It  was,  at  best,  a  gift 
of  doubtful  value,  and  the  Spanish  monarch  seems  to 
have  accepted  it  somewhat  reluctantly,  and  as  a  favor  to 
France  rather  than  in  the  hope  of  deriving  any  benefit 
from  it  for  himself. 

For  reasons  that  will  readily  suggest  themselves,  this 
gift  and  its  acceptance  were  not  made  public,  the  king 
of  France  continuing  to  act  as  if  he  were  still  the  right- 
ful owner  of  all  that  domain.  Indeed,  in  February, 
1763,  at  the  treaty  of  Paris,  he  ceded  to  the  English  all 
of  Louisiana  that  was  east  of  the  Mississippi  River,  ex- 
cept the  city  of  New  Orleans  and  the  island  on  which  it 
was  situated,  and  this  in  face  of  the  fact  that,  less  than 
six  months  before,  he  had  presented  that  very  same  re- 
gion to  his  much-loved  cousin  of  Spain.  No  authorita- 
tive explanation  has  ever  been  given  of  this  transaction  ; 
but  the  fact  that  the  king  of  Spain  was  a  party  to  the 
treaty,  and  made  no  objection  to  the  arrangement  by 
which  he  was  deprived  of  a  good  part  of  the  colony 
which  had  been  so  recently  presented  to  him,  affords 
ample  grounds  for  doubting  the  good  faith  of  the  orig- 


32  Mjssuuiii. 

inal  gift.  In  all  probability  it  was  a  mere  ruse,  under 
cover  of  which  the  French  king  hoped  to  retain  some 
portion  of  his  American  possessions.^ 

As  there  were  no  reasons  why  the  treaty  of  Paris 
should  be  kept  secret,  and  no  possibility  of  keeping 
it  so,  even  it  if  had  been  desired,  its  provisions  were 
at  once  made  public,  and,  early  in  the  ensuing  spring, 
the  people  of  Louisiana  were  officially  informed  of  the 
dismemberment  of  the  colony.  By  this  act,  the  district 
of  the  Illinois  was  divided  into  two  unequal  parts,  all 
on  the  east  side  of  the  Mississijjpi  River  being  ceded  to 
the  English.  Except  the  village  of  Ste.  Genevieve,  all 
the  French  settlements  in  the  district  were  situated 
within  this  area,  including,  of  course,  Fort  Chartres,  the 
chef-lieu,  or  seat  of  justice. 

With  the  surrender  of  this  important  position,  "  the 
key  to  the  trade  of  the  upper  rivers,"  it  became  neces- 
sary to  select  another  situation  within  French,  or  rather 
Spanish,  territory,  to  which  the  government  of  the  dis- 
trict might  be  removed,  and  which  might  serve  as  a 
centre  from  which  the  different  Indian  tribes  could  be 
furnished  with  their  regular  annual  supplies.  Unfortu- 
nately, however,  the  colonial  treasury  was  at  this  time 

^  Under  date  of  May  11,  1763,  the  Spanish  minister,  the  Mar- 
quis Grimaldi,  wrote  to  the  Spanish  ambassador  at  the  court  of 
France  as  follows  :  "  M.  le  due  de  Praslin  (French  minister  of 
the  marine)  se  rappellera  qu'il  y  eut  des  doutes  de  notre  part  a 
I'^gard  de  I'aceeptation.  Mais,  comme  les  memes  raisons  qui 
faisaient  croire  h  la  France  la  n^cessit^  de  la  cession,  conseillaient 
a  I'Espagne  de  I'accepter,  le  roi  le  regut,  quoique  Ton  reconnut 
parfaitement  que  nous  ne  faisions  I'acquisition  que  d'une  charge 
annuelle  de  deux  cent  cinquante  mille  k  trois  cent  mille  piastres, 
en  ^change  d'une  utility  negative  et  ^loign^e,  c'est-a-dire,  celle 
de  poss^der  un  pays  pour  qu'un  autre  ne  le  poss^dat  pas."  — 
Gayarr^,  Ilistoire  de  la  Loutsiane,  vol.  ii.  p.  IGO. 


FRENCH  DOMINATION.  33 

empty.  It  had  neither  money  nor  goods ;  and  as  the 
matter  was  somewhat  urgent,  "  it  was  deemed  best  to 
grant  the  exchisive  trade  of  the  north  and  northwest- 
ern part  of  the  territory  still  remaining  to  a  company 
strong  enough  to  manage  it  and  to  sujiply  the  wants 
of  the  Indians,  and  whicli  could  make  the  necessary 
provision  for  the  accommodation  of  the  district  gov- 
ernment on  the  west  side  of  the  river."  ^  This  was 
done,  and  the  firm  of  Maxeut,  Laclede  &  Co.,  having 
received  the  grant,  fitted  out  an  expedition,  which  left 
New  Orleans  on  the  3d  of  August,  1763,  and  wintered 
at  Fort  Chartres.  Laclede,  or,  to  give  him  his  true 
name,  Pierre  Laclede  Ligueste,  a  junior  partner  in  the 
firm,  was  placed  in  charge  of  the  expedition,  and  in  the 
exercise  of  the  discretion  whicli  seems  to  have  been 
allowed  him,  he  fixed  upon  the  spot  where  the  city  of 
St.  Louis  now  stands  as  the  site  for  the  new  post.  In 
February  or  March  —  the  date  is  somewhat  uncertain 
—  of  the  ensuing  year  he  sent  Auguste  Chouteau  and  a 
band  of  workmen  to  that  place  with  orders  to  make  a 
clearing,  and  to  begin  building  cabins  for  the  accommo- 
dation of  his  men  and  the  storage  of  his  goods.  In 
good  time  a  number  of  French  families,  unwilling  to 
abandon  the  white  flag,  crossed  the  river  and  took  up 
their  residence  at  the  new  post ;  and  in  October,  1765, 
St.  Ange  de  Bellerive,  having  formally  delivered  the 
region  east  of  the  Mississippi  to  Captain  Sterling,  the 
English  representative,  also  removed  to  that  place,  and 
St.  Louis  became  the  official  residence  of  the  command- 
ant, and  the  chef-lieu  of  the  district. 

^  In  this  statement  I  have  followed  Mr.  Oscar  W.  Collet,  whose 
articles  upon  the  early  history  of  Missouri,  in  the  Magazine 
of  Western  History,  and  elsewhere,  are  models  of  careful  re- 
search. 


34  MISSOURI. 

Meanwhile,  in  October,  1764,  the  letter  of  the  kmg 
to  Governor  d'Abbadie  announcing  the  gift  of  Louis- 
iana to  Spain  had  been  made  public,  though  it  was  not 
until  March,  1766,  that  UUoa,  the  Spanish  representa- 
tive, arrived  in  New  Orleans  for  the  purpose  of  receiv- 
ing the  transfer  of  the  colony.  He  seems  to  have  been 
a  woi-thy  sort  of  man,  given  to  literature  and  science, 
perhaps,  rather  than  to  politics,  and  to  have  been  actu- 
ated by  a  sincere  desire  to  discharge  his  disagreeable 
duties  in  such  a  way  as  to  avoid  giving  offense.  In 
this  he  was  disajipointed.  The  people  of  New  Orleans, 
or,  to  speak  more  correctly,  a  portion  of  them,  were  not 
to  be  placated,  and  they  refused  to  recognize  Ulloa's 
authority,  thougli,  with  curious  inconsistency,  they  did 
not  object  to  the  payment  of  all  the  expenses  of  the 
colony  by  the  king  whose  agent  he  was. 

After  a  year  or  two  of  ill-concealed  strife,  Ulloa  was 
banished  by  a  decree  of  the  council,  dated  October  29, 
1768 ;  and,  singularly  enough,  one  of  the  main  charges 
brought  against  him  was  that  he  had  established  posts 
and  ''  hoisted  the  flag  of  Spain  at  the  Balize,  at  the 
Illinois,"  and  at  some  other  places.  It  is  difficult,  at 
this  late  day,  to  understand  how  this  could  have  been 
construed  into  a  crime  against  either  the  French  or 
Spanish  crown,  since  it  was  clearly  in  the  line  of  his 
duty  to  his  own  sovereign,  and  was  done,  if  not  with  the 
approval,  certainly  without  any  objection  on  the  part  of 
the  French  authorities.  It  also  shows  that,  outside  of 
New  Orleans  and  some  other  places  in  that  immediate 
neighborhood,  the  objection  to  the  transfer  was  neither 
as  general  nor  as  inveterate  as  is  sometimes  supposed. 
Indeed,  on  this  point  there  seems  to  be  no  room  for 
doubt,  in  view  of  the  official  recognition  of  Ulloa's  au- 


FRENCH  DOMINATION.  35 

thority  by  the  French  governor,  and  of  the  fact  that  the 
commandants  of  the  different  districts  solicited  and  ob- 
tained from  him  a  continuation  of  their  respective  com- 
mands. That  St.  Ange  was  one  of  these  is,  we  think, 
made  clear  by  the  dispatches  of  Aubry,  the  Acte  cV ac- 
cusation, and  by  his  appointment  to  a  position  in  the 
army  of  his  most  Catholic  majesty  ;  and  thus  it  was 
that,  although  a  Frenchman  by  birth,  he  became  the 
first  commandant  of  upper  Louisiana  under  the  Span- 
ish regime. 


CHAPTER   III. 

SPANISH    DOMINATION. 

A  PEOCEEDING  as  revolutionary  in  its  character  as 
was  the  expulsion  of  UUoa  could  not  be  quietly  passed 
over.  The  Spanish  king  could  not  forget  that  he  had 
accepted  Louisiana  as  a  favor  to  France,  and  that  in  so 
doing  he  had  involved  himself  in  a  heavy  annual  outlay 
without  the  prospect  of  any  immediate  return  ;  and  he 
knew  very  well  that  the  measures  complained  of  were, 
to  a  very  great  extent,  a  legacy  from  the  former  govern- 
ment, and  that  the  changes  that  had  been  made,  by  which 
the  trade  of  the  colony  was  transferred  from  French  to 
Spanish  ports,  were  not  intended  as  acts  of  oppression, 
but  were  in  harmony  with  the  received  commercial  ideas 
of  the  day.  The  hard  lesson  taught  by  the  revolt  of  the 
English  and  Spanish  colonies  in  America  had  not  yet 
been  administered ;  and  it  was  not  until  the  next  gen- 
eration that  the  different  European  powers  were  made 
to  understand  that  the  interest,  real  or  supposed,  of  a 
colony  might  conflict  with  that  of  the  mother  country, 
and  that  when  such  was  the  case,  it  was  the  part  of 
a  wise  political  economy  to  recognize  the  right  of  the 
colonists  to  freedom  of  action  in  trade  as  well  as  in 
politics.  Unable  to  grasp  this  truth,  and  conscious  alike 
of  the  honesty  of  their  own  intentions  and  of  the  sacri- 
fices which  they  made  in  retaining  Louisiana,  the  Spanish 
cabinet  looked  upon  the  conduct  of  the  people  of  New 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  37 

Orleans  as  being  doubly  criminal,  since  it  was  not  only 
revolutionary  in  its  character,  but  it  also  savored  strongly 
of  ingratitude.  As  sucli  it  was  not  to  be  tolerated, 
and  they  sent  O'Reilly  to  the  colony,  with  a  force 
large  enough  to  overcome  all  opposition.  On  the  18th 
of  August,  1769,  he  took  jjcaceable  possession  of  New 
Orleans,  having  found  no  occasion  for  the  use  of  his 
troops.  During  the  nine  or  ten  months  that  had 
elapsed  since  the  banishment  of  UUoa,  a  reaction  had 
taken  place  in  the  minds  of  the  people,  and  those  who 
had  been  most  active  in  fomenting  the  insurrection  were 
now  among  the  first  to  protest  their  willingness  to  submit 
to  the  orders  of  the  king.  They  even  went  so  far  as  to 
assert  that  they  had  never  intended  any  disrespect  to 
him  ;  and  they  besought  O'Reilly,  inasmuch  as  the  revo- 
lution was  due  to  the  severity  of  Ulloa,  and  to  the  with- 
drawal of  certain  privileges  which  they  were  pleased 
to  say  had  been  guarantied  them  by  the  act  of  cession, 
not  to  look  upon  the  colony  in  the  light  of  a  con- 
quered province.  In  spite  of  these  protestations,  an 
example  was  deemed  necessary,  and  twelve  of  the  ring- 
leaders in  the  conspiracy  were  tried  and  condemned. 
Of  these,  one  is  said  to  have  died  and  five  were  exe- 
cuted. The  others  were  imprisoned,  but  only  for  a  short 
time,  as  they  were  pardoned  during  the  ensuing  year,  — 
a  fact  which  is  not  always  mentioned  by  those  who  have 
seen  proper  to  comment  upon  the  transaction. 

With  the  execution  of  these  sentences,  Spanish  justice, 
or  vengeance,  as  it  is  more  often  called,  was  satisfied, 
and  O'Reilly  now  turned  his  attention  to  the  reorganiza- 
tion of  the  colonial  government.  Among  other  changes, 
he  abolished  the  council,  and  superseded  the  French 
code  by  a  set  of  regulations,  based  upon  the  laws  of 


57330 


38  MISSOURI. 

Castile  and  the  code  of  the  Indies,  which  he  caused  to 
be  drawn  up  for  the  guidance  of  the  judges  and  other 
officials.  At  the  first  glance  it  would  seem  as  if  such 
a  wholesale  change  as  this  presaged  must  have  been 
productive  of  no  little  trouble  and  inconvenience,  but  in 
practice  it  was  found  not  to  be  the  case.  The  juris- 
prudence of  Spain,  like  that  of  France,  was  drawji  from 
the  Roman  code,  and  the  two  systems  approached  each 
other  so  closely  in  those  particulars  in  which  they  touched 
the  individual  most  nearly,  that  the  transition  was  not 
perceived  until  it  became  an  accomplished  fact.  More- 
over, a  wide  latitude  seems  to  have  been  allowed  in 
the  construction  and  enforcement  of  these  laws.  Thus, 
for  instance,  although  Spanish  was  declared  to  be  the 
official  language  of  the  colony,  yet  the  use  of  French 
was  permitted  in  the  judicial  and  notarial  acts  of  the 
commandants  of  the  several  districts ;  and  in  upper 
Louisiana,  where  the  laws  of  Spain  relating  to  inherit- 
ance, dowry,  and  grants  of  land  had  been  published 
and  were  in  force,  the  coutume  de  Paris,  or,  as  Bi-acken- 
ridge  calls  it,  the  common  law  of  France,  was  the  system 
by  which  their  contracts  were  governed ;  and  he  gives 
an  instance  in  which  a  case,  involving  the  dower  right 
of  a  widow,  was  decided  by  a  United  States  court  in 
accordance  with  that  law  under  the  "  article  of  cession," 
which  provided  that  respect  should  be  paid  to  the  usages 
and  customs  which  had  prevailed  in  the  country. 

For  the  purjiose  of  facilitating  the  administration  of 
justice,  the  colony  was  divided  into  a  number  of  dis- 
tricts, in  each  of  which  a  commandant  was  a])pointed, 
who  was  invested  with  such  civil  and  military  powers 
as  were  thought  necessary  to  the  discharge  of  his  duties. 
These  officers  were  generally  taken  from  the  army  or 


spajV/sii  domination.  39 

militia,  and  as  they  were  paid  by  the  crown,  and  were, 
as  a  rule,  Frenchmen,  it  is  believed  to  indicate  very 
clearly  the  kindly  feelings  by  which  the  Spanish  au- 
thorities were  animated  in  their  dealings  with  the  col- 
onists. 

In  making  this  division,  the  settlement  of  the  Illinois, 
or.  as  we  shall  now  call  it,  upper  Louisiana,  was  con- 
sidered of  too  much  importance  to  be  classed  any 
longer  with  the  districts,  and  it  was  constituted  into 
a  sort  of  province,  separate  and  distinct  from  lower 
Louisiana,  but  in  some  respects  dependent  upon  it. 
At  this  time  (1769)  it  had  a  population  of  891,  con- 
fined to  the  villages  of  St.  Louis  and  Ste.  Genevieve ; 
and  after  1799,  when  New  Madrid  was  added,  it 
embraced  all  the  region  west  of  the  Mississippi  and 
north  of  the  latitude  of  Memphis,  once  claimed  by 
France.  Practically,  however,  except  perhaps  Dubuque, 
the  new  settlements  within  the  province,  during  the 
whole  of  the  Spanish  domination,  never  extended  be- 
yond the  limits  of  what  is  now  known  as  the  State  of 
Missouri.  A  lieutenant-governor  was  placed  in  com- 
mand, who  derived  his  power  directly  from  the  crown, 
though  he  was  obliged  to  conform  to  the  orders  of  the 
governor-general,  and  also  of  the  intendant,  after  the 
reestablishment  of  this  office  in  1794.  "As  sub-dele- 
gate to  the  latter,  he  superintended  the  finances  within 
his  jurisdiction,  including  everything  that  related  to  the 
Indians,  to  commerce,  to  the  sale  and  grant  of  lands, 
and  to  the  levy  and  collection  of  the  public  revenue. 
As  next  in  authority  to  the  governor,  he  commanded  the 
military,  and  chose  the  commandants  and  other  officers 
of  the  districts"  that  were  within  his  province.  His 
authority  is  said  to  have  been  without  limitation  in  civil 


40  MISSOURI. 

cases,  and  it  extended  to  all  criminal  offenses  except 
capital,  though  his  decisions  were  liable  to  be  reversed 
on  appeal  to  the  governor  or  to  the  intend  ant,  each  of 
whom  had  appellate  jurisdiction  within  his  appropriate 
sphere.  Such  appeals,  however,  were  not  common,  — 
aggravated  crimes  against  the  person  being  so  exceed- 
ingly rare  that  but  one  case  of  the  murder  of  a  white 
man  by  a  white  man  is  reported  in  St.  Louis  during  the 
whole  period  of  Siianish  rule ;  and  in  civil  cases  the 
proceedings  were  of  such  a  character  as  effectually 
to  discourage  appeals,  save  when  the  object  was  the 
reversal  of  erroneous  judgments.  In  case  an  appeal 
was  taken,  the  person  so  appealing  was  obliged  to 
pay  the  opposite  party  the  full  amount  of  the  sum 
decreed  against  him,  bond  being  given  to  refund  the 
sum  thus  paid,  provided  the  decree  was  ultimately  re- 
versed. To  any  one  accustomed  to  our  system  of  juris- 
prudence, this  method  of  administering  justice  will 
appear  arbitrary  and  somewhat  summary  ;  but,  taking 
into  consideration  the  times  and  the  character  of  the 
population,  there  is  much  to  be  said  in  its  favor.  Ac- 
cording to  Major  Stoddard,  who  was  certainly  not  a 
partial  witness,  "  it  created  a  much  greater  degree  of 
punctuality  in  the  payment  of  debts  tlian  is  established 
in  any  part  of  the  United  States."  In  fact,  "  the 
change  produced  by  the  operation  of  the  laws  of  the 
United  States,  the  dilatory  proceedings  of  our  courts, 
the  introduction  of  the  trial  by  jury,  and  the  expenses 
of  legal  contests,"  are  said  to  have  "given  "  a  temporary 
check  to  trade  and  to  the  credit  of  merchants,  particu- 
larly in  upper  Louisiana.  Experience  had  led  them  to 
believe  that  the  Spanish  mode  of  decision,  grounded  on 
equitable  laws,  was  much  the  most  wise  and  salutary ; 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  41 

and  they  murmured  at  a  system  calculated  to  pi-oduce 
delays,  and  in  many  instanc-es  to  create  expenses  equal 
in  amount  to  the  sums  demanded.  They  preferred  the 
judgment  of  one  man  to  that  of  twelve  ;  and  it  is  but 
justice  to  observe  that  the  judicial  officers  were  in  most 
instances  upright  and  impartial  in  their  decisions." 

In  estimating  for  the  exjsenses  of  the  colony,  and  in 
the  measures  which  they  took  to  provide  the  funds  to 
meet  them,  the  Spanish  government  cannot  be  accused 
of  harshness  or  illiberality.  A  duty  of  six  per  cent., 
amounting,  in  most  prosperous  times,  to  an  aggregate 
of  one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  dollars  per  annum, 
was  levied  upon  all  goods  and  other  articles  exported 
or  imported  ;  and  this,  with  the  six  thousand  dollars 
derived  from  a  tax  on  salaries  and  legacies  and  from  a 
license  for  the  sale  of  spirituous  liquors,  constituted  the 
whole  of  the  revenue  paid  by  the  colony.  No  other 
taxes,  direct  or  indirect,  were  known.  Deducting  these 
amounts  from  the  average  annual  expenditure  of  about 
six  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  ($650,000)  dollars,  and 
it  will  leave  in  round  numbers  a  deficit  of  five  hundred 
and  twenty-five  thousand  ($525,000)  dollars,  which  was 
made  up  by  a  charge  of  four  hundred  thousand  dollars 
per  annum  on  the  Mexican  exchequer,  and  by  drafts 
on  the  royal  treasury  for  the  balance.  Compared  with 
the  previous  expenses  of  the  colony,  even  during  the 
extravagant  days  of  the  Mississippi  Company,  or  with 
the  estimates  of  the  Spanish  ministry  at  the  time  of  the 
cession  in  1762,  this  amount  seems  so  out  of  all  propor- 
tion that  it  is  difficult  to  understand  what  became  of  the 
money,  without  giving  credence  to  some  of  the  stories 
that  were  current  as  to  the  impositions  practiced  upon 
the  king  "by  exorbitant  charges  for  useless  fortifica- 
tions, and  for  supplies  that  were  never  furnished." 


42  MISSOURI. 

Under  this  mild  form  of  despotism,  beneficently  ad- 
ministered, life  in  this  portion  of  the  colony  moved  on 
much  as  it  had  done  when  upper  Louisiana  formed  a 
part  of  "  the  district  of  the  Illinois,"  and  was  under  the 
rule  of  the  French.  The  nationality  of  the  chief  execu- 
tive officer,  it  is  true,  was  no  longer  the  same  ;  the  chef- 
lieu,  too,  had  been  transferred  from  Fort  Chartres  to  St. 
Louis,  and  a  number  of  families  had  removed  from  the 
east  side  of  the  river  to  the  west ;  but  with  these  ex- 
ceptions, the  cession  of  this  region  to  Spain  had  not 
been  productive  of  change.  As  has  been  already  in- 
timated, the  colonists  were  almost  exclusively  French 
or  of  French  descent,  and  naturally  enough  they  clung 
to  the  customs  in  which  they  had  been  brought  up,  and 
persisted  in  the  use  of  the  only  language  with  which 
they  were  familiar.  Indeed,  situated  as  they  were,  it  is 
doubtful  whether  any  change  could  have  been  effected 
in  these  particulars  even  had  it  been  desirable.  Except 
in  a  vague  sort  of  way,  they  knew  of  no  other  mode 
of  life  tlian  that  which  they  led.  Being  all  related  by 
blood  or  marriage,  there  were  no  such  things  as  social 
distinctions  among  them.  The  wealthy  and  intelligent 
received,  perhaps,  a  trifle  more  consideration,  but  this 
was  a  personal  compliment,  and  carried  with  it  no  social 
preeminence.  In  their  amusements,  as  in  their  labor, 
at  church,  as  at  the  fireside,  they  met  upon  a  footing  of 
equality.  Moreover,  they  were  separated  by  a  thou- 
sand miles  of  difficult  and  dangerous  travel  from  their 
neighbors  in  Quebec  and  New  Orleans,  and  this,  of 
course,  deprived  them  of  the  healthy  stimulus  which 
might  have  come  to  them  from  a  contrast  of  their  short- 
comings with  the  progress  made  by  others.  Under 
these  circumstances,  in  the  little  world  in  which  they 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  43 

lived,  innovations  were  rare,  and  progress  was  corre- 
spondingly slow.  "■  My  father  did  so  before  me,"  was 
regarded  as  a  satisfactory  way  of  accounting  for  the 
existence  of  a  custom,  no  matter  how  inadequate,  and  it 
usually  proved  a  sufficient  answer  to  any  suggestions  for 
improvement. 

Such  a  life  may  have  been  narrow,  and  there  can  be 
no  doubt  that,  when  judged  by  our  standard,  these  peo- 
ple were  illiterate,  and  except  when  occasion  called  for 
exertion,  they  may  have  been  lazy ;  but,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  men  were  honest  in  their  dealings  and  faith- 
ful to  their  contracts,  and  the  women  were,  with  but  few 
exceptions,  good  wives  and  true  and  efficient  helpmeets 
to  their  husbands.  It  may  also  be  urged  in  their  favor 
that  their  wants  were  but  few,  and  as  these  were  easily 
supplied  there  was  no  necessity  for  their  working  more 
than  they  did  ;  and  that  whilst  they  did  not,  perhaps, 
know  how  to  read  and  write,  yet  they  had  a  reasonably 
clear  idea  of  the  duties  and  amenities  that  belonged  to 
their  condition  in  life,  and  were,  withal,  so  prompt  in 
practicing  them  as  to  extort  from  Stoddard  the  some- 
what unwilling  admission  that  they  were  "  apparently 
the  happiest  people  on  the  globe." 

In  a  community  so  shut  in,  and  leading  the  simple 
sort  of  life  that  the  j^eople  here  did,  the  round  of  occu- 
pations was  necessarily  small.  A  few  of  the  more  wealthy 
and  enterprising  of  the  inhabitants  were  engaged  in  the 
fur-trade  and  kept  small  stocks  of  goods,  not  displayed 
on  shelves  and  counters,  for  as  yet  "  there  were  no  open 
shops  and  stores  as  in  the  States,"  but  packed  away  in 
chests  and  boxes,  to  be  opened  only  when  the  occasion 
called  for  it.  Others,  especially  among  the  young  and 
adventurous,  were  employed  in  the  lead  mines  and  in 


44  MISSOURI. 

boating,  and  a  few  held  positions  under  the  government ; 
but  "  by  far  the  greater  number  were  engaged  in  agri- 
culture." In  fact,  this  may  be  said  "  to  have  been,  in 
some  shape,  the  business  of  all,"  for  the  surplus  produce 
of  this  portion  of  the  colony  was  not  sufficient  to  justify 
such  a  division  of  labor  as  would  withdraw  any  num- 
ber of  persons,  be  it  ever  so  small,  from  the  production 
of  breadstuffs. 

When  not  engaged  with  their  crops,  some  of  these 
small  farmers  "  exercised  the  calling  of  rough  artisans, 
and  became  blacksmiths,  carpenters,  stone-masons,"  etc., 
traveling  about  from  village  to  village,  where  their  ser- 
vices were  needed.  At  first,  there  were  neither  tailors 
nor  shoemakers  among  them,  and  no  baker  until  about 
1775,  when  Barrere,  who  seems  to  have  been  the  first  to 
embark  in  that  business,  came  from  New  Orleans  and 
established  himself  in  St.  Louis.  Flour-milis  and  saw- 
mills, however,  they  had  at  an  early  day,  and  under 
Governor  Delassus,  liberal  grants  of  land  were  made  for 
the  establishment  of  distilleries.  Of  other  manufactures 
they  had  none.  If  we  may  credit  Brackenridge,  there 
was  not  such  a  thing  as  a  loom  or  a  spinning-wheel 
then  in  the  ijrovince  ;  ^  and  the  inhabitants  had  to  de- 
pend upon  Europe,  not  only  for  such  luxuries  as  "  laces," 
but  for  the  materials  from  which  were  made  the 
"  capotes "  of  the  men  and  the  dresses  of  the  women. 
The  linsey,  or  homespun,  of  the  thrifty  Ke;itucky  house- 
wife was  unknown,  and  in  its  place  they  had  two  and 
even  three-point  blankets,  calamanco,  flannels,  etc.,  which 
they  brought,  chiefly,  from  Philadelphia  and  Baltimore, 

^  Stoddard,  however,  gives  a  dii?erent  account.  He  says,  p. 
305,  that  ' '  the  inhabitants  generally  cultivated  a  sufficient  quan- 
tity of  cotton  for  family  pui-poses,  and  spun  and  wove  it  into  cloth." 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  45 

and  which  did  not  always  jjass  through  the  custom  liouse. 
Even  as  simple  an  article  as  a  chuni  was  not  in  use,  and 
those  among  them  who  indulged  in  the  luxury  of  butter 
made  it  either  "•  by  beating  the  cream  in  a  bowl  or 
shaking  it  up  in  a  bottle." 

Of  money  they  had  but  little  —  far  too  little  to  serve 
as  a  medium  of  exchange,  and  in  its  place  peltry,  at  a 
fixed  rate,  was  made  a  legal  tender  in  all  transactions 
in  which  it  was  not  stipulated  that  payment  should  be 
made  in  Spanish  milled  dollars.  Lead,  too,  was  used 
in  the  same  way  ;  in  fact,  among  themselves,  all  trading 
was  done  by  barter.  Even  the  salaries  which  the  gov- 
ernment paid  to  the  priests,  soldiers,  and  officials  were 
advanced  by  the  ti'aders,  generally  in  foreign  goods,  in 
exchange  for  bills  drawn  on  the  colonial  treasury  at 
New  Oi'leans.  Except  the  amounts  covered  by  these 
drafts,  all  other  remittances  were  made  in  lead,  pel- 
try, and  provisions.  Of  the  total  amount  of  this  trade 
but  little  is  known.  The  value  of  the  peltries  ex- 
ported during  the  fifteen  years  next  preceding  1804 
is  said  to  have  been  a  trifle  over  two  hundred  thou- 
sand dollars  ($200,000)  per  annum ;  but  this  could  not 
have  been  the  whole  amount,  for  as  early  as  1786,  the 
English  are  said  to  have  "  seized  upon  the  richest  part 
of  this  trade  by  ingratiating  themselves  into  the  favor  of 
the  natives  that  lived  on  the  Des  Moines  "  and  elsewhere 
west  of  the  Mississippi.  Of  the  amount  of  the  other 
articles  exported,  nothing  definite  is  known.  All  that 
can  be  said  is  that  the  merchants  of  upper  Louisiana 
sent  their  furs  and  peltries  to  Canada  and  brought  back 
such  goods  as  were  used  in  the  Indian  trade  ;  that  they 
shipped  lead  and  provisions  to  New  Orleans  and  ex- 
changed them  for  groceries,  and  that  they  obtained  their 


46  MISSOURI. 

supplies  of  other  articles  from  Philadelphia  and  Balti- 
more in  return  for  lead  and  salt,  which  are  said  to  have 
found  their  way  up  the  Ohio  in  large  quantities.  To 
speak  of  such  a  people  as  wanting  in  enterprise,  or  to 
call  the  hardy  voyagers  on  these  "  wild  and  wicked  " 
western  rivers  lazy,  as  is  not  unfrequently  done,  indi- 
cates a  confusion  of  ideas  and  terms  that  can  hardly 
be  reconciled  with  truth  and  fairness. 

As  land  had  no  value  unless  it  was  improved,  the 
wealth  of  the  colonists  consisted  principally  in  personal 
property,  slaves  being  regarded  as  its  most  desirable 
form.  For  the  same  reason  rent  was  virtually  unknown. 
Every  head  of  a  family  was  entitled  to  a  house-lot  in 
the  village  proper,  to  as  much  of  the  common  field  as 
he  could  cultivate,  and  to  the  right  of  pasturage  on  the 
village  common.  In  return  for  these  advantages,  he 
was  required  to  keep  up  his  part  of  the  "  common  " 
fence,  to  aid  in  road  making,  and  bear  his  share  of  any 
other  improvements  which  the  villagers,  at  their  regular 
annual  town  meeting,  should  order  to  be  made.  Under 
such  a  system  there  was  no  inducement  to  acquire  any 
more  land  than  was  absolutely  necessary  ;  and  although 
concessions,  embracing  hundreds  and  even  thousands  of 
acres  of  fertile  lands,  could  be  had  for  the  asking,  it 
was  not  until  towards  the  close  of  the  century,  when 
immigrants  from  the  States  began  to  pour  into  the  prov- 
ince, that  land  took  on  a  recognized  value,  and  that 
"  the  principal  inhabitants  began  to  open  plantations  at 
some  little  distance  from  the  town,"  and  to  cultivate 
them  after  the  English- American  fashion.  "  As  a  con- 
sequence, passengers,"  we  are  told,  "  could  now  go 
through  the  streets  without  danger  of  being  jostled  by 
horses,  cows,  hogs,  and  oxen,  which  formerly  crowded 
them." 


SPANISH  DOMINATION,  47 

Of  politics  they  knew  but  little  and  cared  less.  It 
was  the  commandant's  business,  so  they  thought,  to  look 
after  "  all  that  sort  of  thing,"  and  consequently  they 
did  not  allow  it  to  trouble  them.  Neither  did  they  con- 
cern themselves,  to  any  extent,  about  education.  As 
early  as  1772,  a  school  was  ordered  to  be  established  in 
New  Orleans,  and  a  director  was  sent  out,  together  with 
three  teachers,  one  of  grammar,  another  of  Latin,  and  a 
third  of  reading  and  writing.  The  parents,  however, 
were  not  anxious  to  secure  the  benefits  "  which  the 
magnanimous  heart  of  his  Majesty  had  put  within  their 
reach"  for  their  children,  and  they  failed  to  send  tkem 
to  the  school.  Not  a  single  pupil,  we  are  told,  ever  pre- 
sented himself  for  the  Latin  class  ;  and  those  who  came 
to  be  taught  reading  and  writing  were  but  few  in  num- 
ber and  uncertain  in  their  attendance.  La  1788,  the 
school-house  was  burned  down,  when  a  certain  Don 
Andres  Almonaster,  to  his  honor  be  it  said,  offered  a 
small  "  edifice,  containing  a  room  thirteen  feet  in  length 
by  twelve  in  width,  which  would  suffice  for  the  present," 
and  might  be  used  until  he  could  build  another,  which 
he  proposed  to  do  at  a  cost  to  himself  of  six  thousand 
dollars.  The  Ursuline  convent  at  New  Orleans  was 
also  in  receipt  of  his  Majesty's  bounty  to  the  amount  of 
six  hundred  dollars  jjer  annum  ;  but  in  no  other  part  of 
the  colony  was  there  any  provision  made  for  what  may 
be  termed  public  education,  nor  was  there  any  legal 
ordinance  on  the  subject.  In  St.  Louis  and  Ste.  Ge- 
nevieve private  schools,  in  which  children  were  taujjht 
reading,  writing,  and  a  little  arithmetic,  were  occasionally 
established,  but  they  were  usually  of  short  duration,  and 
produced  no  good  or  lasting  effect  in  the  society  at  lai'ge. 
The  great  mass  of  the  people   were  unable  to  avail  of 


48  MISSOURI. 

even  these  scanty  advantages.  Numbers  of  them  "  could 
not  read  or  write  their  names,"  and  yet  we  are  assured, 
on  the  authority  o£  educated  travelers,  that  "  their 
manners  were  easy,  their  conversation  pleasant  and 
often  instructive,  and  many  of  them  manifested  extraor- 
dinary natural  endowments."  It  is  but  just  to  add  that 
some. of  the  more  wealthy  sent  their  sons  to  Canada  to 
be  educated,  and  that  there  were  among  them  a  few 
graduates  from  European  universities. 

But  whilst  the  great  majority  of  the  people  were  thus 
illiterate,  and  careless  about  political  and  educational 
matters,  they  were  by  no  means  neglectful  of  their  reli- 
gious concerns  or  their  amusements.  The  ceremonies  and 
festivals  of  the  church  occupied  not  a  little  of  their  lei- 
sure, and  they  seem  to  have  been  much  given  to  cards, 
billiards,  and  other  games,  as  well  as  to  balls  and  assem- 
blies. These  latter  usually  took  place  on  Sunday  after- 
noon, after  vespers,  and  instead  of  being  scenes  of  frivol- 
ity they  were  "  schools  of  manners,"  where  the  children 
were  taught  "  the  essence  of  politeness  and  self-denial." 
When  questioned  as  to  what  seemed  to  their  Protestant 
neighbors  like  a  desecration  of  the  day  they  would  an- 
swer :  "  That  men  were  made  for  happiness,  and  that 
the  more  they  are  able  to  enjoy  themselves,  the  more 
acceptable  they  are  to  their  Creator.  They  are  of  opin- 
ion that  a  sullen  countenance,  an  attention  to  gloomj^ 
subjects,  a  set  form  of  speech,  and  a  stiff  behavior  are 
more  indicative  of  hypocrisy  than  of  religion  ;  and  they 
have  often  remarked  that  those  who  practice  these  sin- 
gularities will  most  assuredly  cheat  and  defraud  their 
neighbors  during  the  rest  of  the  week.  Such,"  it  is  said, 
"  are  the  religious  sentiments  of  a  people  void  of  supersti- 
tion ;  of  a  people  prone  to  hospitality,  urbanity  of  man- 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  49 

ners,  and  innocent  recreation  ;  and  who  present  their 
daily  orisons  at  the  throne  of  grace  with  as  much  con- 
fidence of  success  as  the  most  devout  Puritans  in  ex- 
istence." 

Of  course  they  were  all  Catholics ;  but  whilst  great 
sticklers  for  their  own  form  of  worship,  they  were  not 
disposed  to  interfere  with  the  religious  rights  of  others. 
In  this  they  were  far  more  liberal  than  were  their  laws. 
Thus,  when  the  Holy  Office  endeavored  to  gain  a  footing 
in  New  Orleans,  Governor  Miro  arrested  the  would-be 
inquisitor  and  shipped  him  back  to  Spain  ;  and  when,  a 
few  years  later,  in  upper  Louisana,  that  sturdy  Baptist, 
Abraham  Music,  asked  leave  to  "hold  meeting"  at  his 
house,  Governor  Trudeau  is  said  to  have  answered : 
"  It  cannot  be  granted,  as  it  is  a  violation  of  law. 
What  I  mean,"  he  added,  "  is  that  you  must  not  put  a 
bell  on  your  house  and  call  it  a  church,  nor  suffer  any 
one  to  christen  your  children  but  the  parish  priest ;  but 
if  any  of  your  friends  choose  to  meet  at  your  house,  sing, 
pray,  and  talk  about  religion,  you  will  not  be  molested, 
provided  you  continue,  as  I  suppose  you  are,  good  Catho- 
lics." The  worthy  governor  knew  that,  as  Baptists,  they 
did  not  believe  in  infant  baptism,  and  that  they  did  not 
need  the  sound  of  a  bell  to  show  them  the  way  to  "  meet- 
ing." 

In  a  community  so  constituted,  and  under  the  rule  of 
officers  who  were  instructed  to  "  maintain  tranquillity  and 
contentment  among  the  inhabitants,"  and  to  cultivate 
friendly  relations  with  their  neighbors,  red  as  well  as 
white,  there  was  but  little  to  disturb  the  tranquil  flow  of 
what  may,  by  courtesy,  be  termed  public  affairs.  In  fact, 
the  records  of  the  province  contain  but  little  save  grants 
of  land  in  the  villasfe  and  common  fields,  notices  of  the 


60  MISSOURI. 

sales  of  the  property  of  deceased  persons,  transcripts  of 
deeds  and  wills,  and  occasionally  an  account  of  a  suit 
for  debt  or  slander.  Even  the  coming  and  going  of 
the  lieutenant-governors  is  not  unfrequently  a  matter  of 
inference,  to  be  determined  by  the  date  of  the  documents 
to  which  their  signatures  are  attached.  In  spite,  how- 
ever, of  the  simple  character  of  these  records,  tradition 
has  preserved  a  few  events  that  were  regarded  as  being 
of  sufficient  importance  to  be  perpetuated,  and  it  may  be 
well  enough  to  glance  briefly  at  some  of  them,  more  by 
way  of  showing  the  character  of  the  occurrences  that 
were  thought  worthy  of  commemoration,  than  for  any 
influence  which  they  had  in  shaping  the  destiny  of  the 
province. 

Thus  we  find  that,  in  1770,  St.  Ange  gave  place  as 
lieutenant-governor  to  Piernas.  He,  in  turn,  was  fol- 
lowed in  1775  by  Cruzat,  and  in  1778  by  De  Leyba, 
who  remained  in  office  until  his  death  in  1780,  when 
Cruzat  Avas  sent  to  the  province  for  the  second  time, 
and  held  the  command  until  1787. 

During  these  different  administrations,  which  cover 
rather  more  than  half  the  period  of  Spanish  domination, 
the  revolt  of  the  English  colonies,  or,  as  it  is  called,  the 
American  Revolution,  took  place  ;  and  although  it  was 
indirectly  fraught  with  important  consequences  to  lower 
Louisiana  and  the  Si3anish  crown,  yet  its  influence 
seems  hardly  to  have  been  felt  in  the  portion  of  the  col- 
ony with  which  we  have  to  deal.  Indeed,  it  only  inter- 
ests us  so  far  as  the  capture,  in  1778,  of  Kaskaskia  and 
Cahokia  by  the  Virginians,  under  General  George  Rogers 
Clai-k,  and  the  presence  of  these  troops  on  the  east  side 
of  the  river  in  the  spring  of  1780  can  be  said  to  have 
contributed  to  the  defeat  of  the  invasion  which  tradition 


SPANISH  DOAflNATION.  51 

has  magnified  into  an  attack  upon  St.  Louis,  and  which 
has  caused  the  year  1780  to  pass  into  local  history  as 
Vannee  du  coup,  the  year  of  the  attack. 

According  to  the  account  handed  down  by  Stoddard, 
the  British  governor  at  Michilimackinac  anxious  to  pre- 
vent the  invasion  of  Florida  by  Governor  Galvez  of  Lou- 
isiana, sought  to  create  a  diversion  by  sending  a  force  of 
150  white  men  and  1,500  Indians  down  the  Mississippi 
for  the  purpose  of  attacking  St.  Louis.  No  direct  as- 
sault was  made  upon  the  village,  but  during  the  short 
time  that  the  hostile  troops  were  in  the  neighborhood  a 
number  —  some  accounts  say  as  many  as  sixty  —  of  the 
inhabitants  were  killed  and  thirty  taken  prisoners.  This 
is  the  story  as  it  is  usually  told,  and  in  the  main  it 
is  correct,  except  in  the  number  of  killed  and  prison- 
ers, which  is  greatly  exaggerated.  Another  version  of 
the  affair  represents  "  the  attack "  as  having  been 
brought  about  by  a  Canadian  Frenchman  named  Du- 
charme,  in  revenge  for  the  loss  of  his  goods,  which  had 
been  confiscated  by  the  Spanish  authorities  because  he 
was  caught  trading  with  the  Indians  of  the  Missouri. 
In  this  account,  also,  there  is  an  element  of  truth,  for 
Ducharme's  goods  had  been  seized,  and  he  was  engaged 
in  the  invasion.  It  is  even  intimated  that  it  was  owing, 
in  part,  to  his  treachery  that  the  expedition  proved  a 
failure. 

Recent  investigations  have  thrown  additional  light 
upon  this  subject  ;  and  it  now  appears  that  whilst  it  was 
exj^ected  that  the  posts  which  had  been  taken  by  Clark 
would  be  recaptured,  yet  the  expedition,  as  planned  in 
London,  was  a  part  of  a  comprehensive  movement  Avhich 
had  for  its  object  the  expulsion  of  the  Spaniards  from 
the  Mississippi  valley.     Having  captured  St.  Louis  and 


52  MISSOURI. 

the  other  villages  in  that  neighborhood,  these  troops  were 
to  proceed  down  the  river  and  cooperate  with  an  Eng- 
lish force  from  below  in  an  attack  upon  New  Orleans 
and  the  Spanish  settlements  on  the  lower  Mississippi. 
It  was  a  magnificent  scheme,  but,  unfortunately  for  its 
success,  the  Spaniards  and  Americans  in  the  valley 
learned  of  it  almost  as  soon  as  the  English,  and  they  at 
once  took  measures  to  defeat  it.  In  lower  Louisiana, 
Governor  Galvez,  without  waiting  to  be  attacked,  raised 
a  force  and  took  Natchez,  Baton  Rouge,  and  other  Eng- 
lish posts  on  tlie  Mississippi  ;  whilst  in  Illinois,  the  in- 
vaders found  the  Virginians  under  Clark  so  well  pre- 
pared that  they  did  not  dare  to  attack  them.  For  this 
reason,  and  owing  also,  it  is  said,  to  the  treachery  of  Calve 
and  Ducharme,  the  expedition  was  broken  uji  and  re- 
turned homewards,  though  not  until  "  twenty  Canadians 
and  a  very  few  traders  and  servants  had  made  an  attack 
upon  Pencour  "  —  Pain  court  —  St.  Louis,  in  the  course 
of  which,  according  to  the  report  of  Lieutenant-Governor 
Sinclair,  "  68  were  killed,  and  18  blacks  and  white  peo- 
ple taken  prisoners." 

This  is  probably  the  truth  of  the  affair,  except  as  to 
the  number  of  killed  and  prisoners,  and  we  have  dwelt 
upon  it  at  some  length  for  the  reason  that  it  exemplifies 
the  difficulties  that  attend  an  investigation  into  the  his- 
tory, or  rather  the  traditions,  of  the  province,  and  be- 
cause it  is  the  only  instance  in  which  these  settlements 
were  ever  seriously  threatened  by  a  hostile  force.  Un- 
doubtedly there  are  numerous  statements  in  the  early 
records  as  to  the  de]n'edations  committed  by  the  Indians, 
and  it  cannot  be  denied  that,  on  more  than  one  occa- 
sion, they  murdered  a  settler  and  were  guilty  of  other 
acts  of  hostility ;  but,  as  a  rule,  these  outrages  are  be- 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  53 

lieved  to  have  been  the  work  of  individual  savages  on 
horse-stealing  expeditions,  and  not  the  result  of  any- 
concerted  tribal  action.  The  fact  that  the  French  al- 
ways lived  in  compact  villages  and  not  on  separate 
farms,  in  exposed  positions,  as  was  often  the  case  with 
the  English-American  pioneers,  insured  them  a  certain 
amount  of  protection  from  Indian  attacks  ;  and  when,  a 
few  years  later,  bands  of  Shawnees,  Delawares,  and  other 
tribes  were  brought  westward  and  established  on  res- 
ervations, where  they  served  as  a  barrier  between  the 
whites  and  their  troublesome  neighbors  the  Osages,  this 
comparative  immunity  was  converted  into  an  absolute 
guarantee  against  all  danger  from  that  quarter.  Indeed, 
it  is  questionable  whether,  even  without  these  precau- 
tions, there  would  have  been  any  very  serious  risk,  for 
the  reason  that  the  Spanish  government,  in  all  its  deal- 
ings with  the  Indians  of  the  Mississippi  valley,  seems 
to  have  been  actuated  by  a  sense  of  humanity  that  was 
in  advance  of  the  times ;  and  because  the  officials  of 
upper  Louisiana,  in  their  treatment  of  these  people, 
were  ordered  to  pursue  a  policy  that  was  at  once  just 
and  conciliatory  in  its  character.  Instead  of  enslaving 
them,  O'Reilly,  in  1770,  notified  the  inhabitants  of  Lou- 
isiana that  they  would  have  to  prepare  for  the  emancipa- 
tion of  those  who  were  already  in  bondage  ;  and  so  far 
from  trying  to  dispossess  them  of  their  lands  and  drive 
them  otf,  the  French,  and  after  them  the  Spaniards,  en- 
deavored to  make  use  of  them  as  hunters  and  small  far- 
mers, and  to  this  end  they  did  not  hesitate  to  establish 
them,  so  far  as  they  were  able,  in  permanent  settlements 
close  to  their  own  villages,  as  was  the  case  at  Kaskaskia, 
Ste.  Genevieve,  and  other  places.  That  such  a  course  of 
conduct  bore  good  fruit  is  well  known  to  every  student 


64  MISSOURI. 

of  border  history  ;  and  it  is  not  therefore  improbable 
that  the  contrast  between  this  method  of  treatment  and 
that  pursued  by  the  English-American  colonists  may 
have  given  rise  to  the  indignant  remonstrance  which  a 
Shawnee  chief  is  said  to  have  addressed  to  General 
Harrison  :  "  You  call  us  your  children,"  said  he  ;  "  why 
do  you  not  make  us  happy,  as  our  fathers  the  French 
did  ?  They  never  took  from  us  our  lands  ;  indeed,  they 
were  in  common  between  us.  They  planted  where  they 
pleased,  and  they  cut  wood  where  they  pleased,  and  so 
did  we.  But  now,  if  a  poor  Indian  attempts  to  take  a 
little  bark  from  a  tree  to  cover  him  from  the  rain,  up 
comes  a  white  man  and  threatens  to  shoot  him,  claiming 
the  tree  as  his  own."  Only  on  one  occasion  does  there 
appear  to  have  been  a  prospect  of  a  war  between  these 
colonists  and  the  Indians,  and  that  was  settled  in  such 
a  curious  manner  that  the  story  would  not  be  credible, 
were  it  not  vouched  for  by  as  trustworthy  an  authority 
as  Major  Stoddard.  According  to  him,  during  a  sort  of 
predatory  war  which,  in  1794,  raged  between  the  whites 
and  a  tribe  of  Missouri  Indians,  a  chief,  with  a  party  of 
his  warriors,  boldly  entered  St.  Louis  and  demanded  an 
interview  with  Governor  Trudeau,  to  whom  he  said  : 
"  We  have  come  to  offer  you  peace  ;  we  have  been  at 
war  with  you  many  moons,  and  what  have  we  done  ? 
Nothing.  Our  warriors  have  tried  every  means  to  meet 
yours  in  battle  ;  but  you  will  not,  you  dare  not  fight  us ; 
you  are  a  parcel  of  old  women.  What  can  be  done 
with  such  a  people  but  make  peace,  since  you  will  not 
fight  ?  I  come  therefore  to  offer  you  peace,  and  to  bury 
the  hatchet,  to  brighten  the  chain  and  again  to  open  the 
way  between  us."  The  Spanish  governor,  it  is  added, 
was  obliged  to  bear  the  insult,  but  there  was  no  war. 


SPANISH  DOAf  I  NATION.  55 

The  Indians,  however,  were  not  the  only  people  against 
whom  it  was  necessary  to  be  on  the  watch.  The  recent 
incursion,  though  a  faihire,  showed  the  possibiUty  of  an 
invasion  by  the  EngUsh  from  Canada,  and,  accordingly, 
Cruzat,  with  the  view  of  guarding  against  an  attack  from 
that  direction,  caused  St.  Louis  to  be  fortified  on  the  land 
side  by  a  stockade,  to  which  in  after  years  was  added 
sundry  stone  towers,  a  demi-lune,  and  a  bastion.  As 
against  any  force  which  the  Indians  could  bring,  these 
defenses  were  sufficient,  though  fortunately,  perhaps,  for 
the  villagers  their  strength  was  never  tested  by  the  use 
of  cannon. 

During  the  remainder  of  Cruzat's  term  there  was  but 
little  to  note.  A  census  taken  in  1785  gives  the  total 
population  of  the  province  at  about  fifteen  hundred  ;  and 
in  this  same  year  there  was  a  freshet  in  the  Mississippi 
which  obliged  the  inhabitants  of  Ste.  Genevieve  to  aban- 
don the  site  of  the  "  old  "  village,  and  to  remove  to  the 
situation  which  the  town  now  occupies,  on  higher  ground. 
It  was  a  memorable  event  in  the  annals  of  the  colony, 
and  gave  to  the  year  the  significant  title  of  Vannee  des 
grands  eaux,  the  year  of  the  high  water. 

In  1787,  called  Vannee  des  dix  batteaux,  from  the  ar- 
rival at  oiie  time  of  ten  boats  from  New  Orleans,  Perez 
came  into  office ;  and  it  was  during  his  administration 
that  bands  of  the  Shawnees,  Delawares,  etc.,  driven  back 
by  the  advance  of  the  whites  across  the  Alleghany  Moun- 
tains, were  induced  to  forsake  their  homes  in  the  region 
north  of  the  Ohio,  and  to  establish  themselves  upon  the 
lands  which  had  been  granted  them  in  the  neighborhood 
of  Cape  Girardeau,  Ste.  Genevieve,  and  the  other  villages 
on  the  Spanish  side  of  the  Mississippi.  Here  they  were 
permitted  to  remain  for  some  thirty -five  years  ;  and  it  is 


66  MISSOURI. 

a  sad  commentary  upon  our  treatment  of  these  people 
that  when,  in  1825,  they  were  called  on  to  remove  still 
farther  westward,  the  improvements  which  they  left  be- 
hind them  are  said  to  have  compared  not  unfavorably 
with  those  of  the  average  of  their  white  neighbors.  On 
the  expiration  of  Perez's  term  of  office  in  1793,  Trudeau 
was  appointed,  and  in  1799  he  was  succeeded  by  Delas- 
sus,  a  Frenchman  by  descent,  if  not  by  birth,  who  was 
the  last  lieutenant-governor  of  upper  Louisiana  under 
the  Spanish  regime,  as  St.  Ange,  another  Frenchman,  had 
been  the  first. 

Under  these  two  administrations,  which  embrace  the 
last  decade  of  Spanish  rule  in  the  Mississippi  valley, 
there  were  a  few  events,  as  for  instance  the  "  hard  win- 
ter "  of  1798-99,  the  prevalence  of  "  the  small-pox  "  in 
1801,  and  some  others,  which  have  been  commemorated 
in  the  peculiar  fashion  of  these  villagers,  but  to  which  it 
is  unnecessary  to  do  more  than  refer,  as,  however  impor- 
tant they  may  have  appeared  at  the  time,  they  were 
without  any  influence  in  shaping  the  future  of  the  col- 
ony, and  are,  therefore,  of  but  little  moment  when  com- 
pared with  the  increase  of  population  which  took  place 
during  this  period,  and  with  the  total  change  in  its 
character. 

To  appreciate  the  full  significance  of  these  facts,  it  is 
necessary  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  first  settlers  in  this 
province  were  emigrants  from  Fort  Chartres,  Kaskaskia, 
and  the  other  villages  on  the  Illinois  side  of  the  river  ; 
that  they  were  almost  exclusively  French  or  of  French 
descent,  and  that  for  twenty  years  or  more,  in  spite  of 
the  gradual  increase  in  population,  this  distinct  national 
character  was  maintained.  Even  as  late  as  1788,  if  we 
may  judge  from    the   village  records,  the    registers  of 


I 


SPAN  IS  fl  DOMINATION.  57 

deaths  and  marriages,  there  were  hut  few  of  the  two 
thousand  inhabitants  that  were  then  credited  to  the  prov- 
ince who  had  not  sprung  from  this  stock.  About  this 
time,  however,  two  events  occurred,  which,  by  turning  in 
this  direction  a  fair  share  of  the  emigration  from  "  the 
States,"  increased  the  population  of  the  province  so  rap- 
idly, and  wrought  such  a  change  in  its  character,  that,  in 
1799,  it  amounted  to  six  thousand,  and  in  1803  to  about 
ten  thousand,  of  which  number  three  fifths,  or  six  thou- 
sand, were  English-Americans. 

The  first  in  time,  and  peihaps  the  more  important  of 
the  causes  which  contributed  to  this  result,  was  the  adop- 
tion by  Congress  of  the  Ordinance  of  1787,  prohibiting 
slavery  in  the  region  north  of  the  Ohio  and  south  of 
the  Lakes.  This  ordinance,  it  will  be  remembered,  was 
passed  by  a  vote  of  five  slave  and  three  free  States,  and 
although  it  was  intended  to  be  prospective  in  its  action, 
yet  its  immediate  practical  effect  was  to  deter  those  who 
owned  slaves  fi-om  settling  in  the  region  to  which  it  ap- 
plied. It  also  led  some  of  those  who  had  already  estab- 
lished themselves  in  that  region,  and  who  wei'e  desirous 
of  retaining  that  kind  of  projjerty  in  their  families,  to 
take  up  their  residence  on  the  other  side  of  the  Missis- 
sippi, where  the  conditions  were  such  as  to  enable  them 
to  carry  out  this  wish.  Powerful  as  this  motive  must 
have  been  in  turning  the  attention  of  slaveholding  emi- 
grants in  tliis  direction,  its  influence  was  vastly  increased, 
and  its  effect  hastened,  by  the  necessity  which,  in  1796, 
the  Spanish  authorities  conceived  themselves  to  be  under 
of  strengthening  the  people  of  upper  Louisiana,  so  that 
they  might  be  able  to  defend  themselves  against  a  threat- 
ened invasion  of  the  English  from  Canada.  To  enable 
them  to  do  this  successfully,  it  was  thought  necessary  to 


68     ,  MISSOURI. 

increase  their  numbers ;  and  hence  the  great  induce- 
ments which  were  held  out  to  emigrants,  especially  to 
those  from  the  United  States,  as  it  was  thought  that 
their  hostility  to  the  English  would  prove  a  guarantee 
of  their  fidelity  to  Spain.  Accordingly,  lands  were 
freely  granted  to  all  settlers,  attended  with  no  other  ex- 
penses than  those  of  surveys  and  office  fees.  A  farm 
of  800  acres  could  be  obtained  for  forty-one  dollars, 
exclusive  of  the  amounts  paid  to  the  chainmen  and  for 
the  confirmation  of  the  title  at  New  Orleans.  Even  these 
payments  were  not  necessary  to  give  possession.  This 
was  certainly  little  enough  ;  and  when  we  add  that  every 
such  concession  might  be  made  to  cover  a  lead  mine,  and 
that  there  was  practically  no  such  thing  in  the  province 
as  taxation,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  temptation  to  emi- 
grate was  of  a  character  that  the  average  pioneer  from 
Kentucky  and  Tennessee  would  find  it  difficult  to  resist. 
A  less  attractive  prize  had  lured  Boone  and  men  of  liis 
stamp  across  the  Alleghanies,  and  it  was  therefore  but 
natural  that,  being  unable  to  find  their  places  in  the 
new  order  of  things  which  they  saw  growing  up  around 
them,  they  should  yield  to  the  tempting  offers  of  the 
Spanish  authorities,  and  cross  the  Mississippi  in  search 
of  the  homes  which  they  had  failed  to  find  in  regions 
farther  to  the  east. 

In  this  connection,  it  is  worthy  of  note,  and  the  fact 
certainly  redounds  to  the  credit  of  the  Spanish  govern- 
ment, that  when  making  these  grants,  they  pi-actically 
showed  no  discrimination  in  favor  of  Catholics  as  against 
Protestants.  In  1790  the  king  had  given  orders  that 
the  settlers  were  not  to  be  disturbed  in  the  exercise 
of  their  religion  ;  in  1797,  the  land  laws  of  Gayoso, 
narrow  and  bigoted  as  they  were  in  some  respects,  al- 


SPANISH   DOMINATION.  59 

lowed  liberty  of  conscience  for  the  first  generation  of 
emigrants  to  lower  Louisiana ;  and  in  the  upjDer  part 
of  the  colony,  as  we  have  seen,  the  officials  conven- 
iently ignored  the  regulations  that  interfered  with  emi- 
gration, including  those  that  bore  heavily  upon  all 
who  did  not  belong  to  the  established  church.  In  fact, 
there  is  reason  to  believe  that  as  early  as  1788,  Gardo- 
qui,  the  Spanish  minister  at  Philadelphia,  in  the  conces- 
sion which  he  made  to  Colonel  Morgan  of  some  millions 
of  acres  in  the  New  Madrid  district,  not  only  granted  the 
prospective  colonists  the  right  of  self-government,  but 
also  freedom  of  religious  worship.  This  concession,  it  is 
true,  was  not  sanctioned  by  Governor  Miro,  and  it  was 
therefore  inoperative  ;  but  the  fact  that  it  was  granted 
is  proof  of  the  growing  liberality  of  the  Spanish  authori- 
ties, and  of  the  free  and  easy  manner  in  which  the  laws  of 
the  colony  were  interpreted.  In  refusing  to  confirm  this 
grant,  Governor  Miro  refers  to  the  fact  that  it  would  have 
created  an  independent  republic  within  Louisiana,  and 
says  :  "  The  circumstance  of  their  governing  themselves 
whilst  the  king  should  pay  the  magistrates  would  attract 
here  a  prodigious  multitude  of  people  .  .  .  who  would, 
on  the  slightest  provocation,  declare  themselves  indepen- 
dent, and,  what  is  worse,  having  the  free  use  of  their  re- 
spective religions,  they  would  never  become  Catholics." 
With  grim  humor,  the  worthy  governor  adds,  that  "  on 
such  conditions  he  would  undertake  to  depopulate  the 
greater  part  of  the  United  States,  and  draw  all  their 
citizens  to  Louisiana,  including  the  whole  Congress  it- 
self." 

With  the  incoming  tide  of  emigration,  there  was  a 
marked  change  in  the  values  of  certain  kinds  of  prop- 
erty.     Land  which  had  heretofore  been  held  in  little 


60  MISSOURI. 

esteem  was  now  eagerly  sought  after ;  and  all  who  were 
entitled  to  concessions  solicited  and  obtained  them. 
Among  those  who  were  thus  fortunate  were  "  most  of 
the  French  inhabitants,"  and  also  those  officials  who 
were  entitled  to  compensation,  and  whose  services,  in 
accordance  with  Spanish  custom,  were  rewarded  by- 
grants  of  lands  instead  of  by  gifts  of  money.  A  few 
of  these  concessions  were  on  a  large  scale,  embracing  a 
league  square  or  more  of  land,  but  the  great  majority 
of  them  were  far  from  extravagant ;  and  yet  so  numer- 
ous were  they  that,  according  to  Major  Stoddard,  "  the 
quantity  of  land  claimed  in  upper  Louisiana  under 
French  and  Spanish  titles,  amounted  to  one  million 
seven  hundred  and  twenty-one  thousand  four  hundred 
and  ninety-three  (1,721,493)  arpents,  a  quantity  "  which, 
we  are  told,  "  was  not  exorbitant  when  compared  with 
the  population  of  the  province." 

Of  these  grants,  some  were  general  and  others  special ; 
and  the  titles  which  they  conveyed  were  either  complete 
or  incomplete.  The  concessions  were  general  when 
they  could  be  located  upon  any  portion  of  the  public 
domain  that  was  not  taken  up,  and  they  were  special 
when  they  were  designated  by  certain  metes  and  bounds. 
When  the  grant  was  derived  directly  from  the  crown, 
or  when  it  was  sanctioned  by  the  regularly  constituted 
authority  at  New  Orleans,  the  title  which  it  conveyed 
was  said  to  be  complete  ;  but  when  the  concession  was 
based  upon  a  "  naked  grant  "  of  the  lieutenant-governor 
or  of  a  commandant,  and  had  not  received  the  approval 
of  the  proper  officers  at  New  Orleans,  it  was  incom- 
plete. Nineteen  twentieths  of  the  titles  belonged  to  the 
latter  or  incomplete  class,  and  this  gave  rise  to  much 
trouble  and  litigation  before  the  evil  was  finally  reme- 


SPANISH  DOMINATION.  61 

died.  Congress,  however,  set  to  work  to  accomplish 
it,  and  though  it  took  a  good  many  years  and  several 
acts,  yet,  thanks  to  the  liberal  policy  which  was  adopted, 
it  is  probable  that  there  were  but  few  bona  fide  grants 
made  by  the  French  and  Spanish  authorities  that  were 
not  ultimately  confirmed. 

Such,  in  brief,  is  the  history  of  upper  Louisiana 
under  Spanish  domination,  and  the  picture  which  it  pre- 
sents of  the  condition  of  the  inhabitants  at  the  close  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  This  picture,  it  will  be  observed, 
is  not  sketched  from  materials  furnished  by  the  colo- 
nists themselves,  but  is  made  up  from  accounts  given 
by  those  who,  however  favorably  disposed  towards  them, 
were,  with  but  few  exceptions,  either  ignorant  of  what 
was  really  meritorious  in  the  Spanisli  form  of  govern- 
ment, or  were  so  hostile  to  it  as  to  be  able  to  see  but  little 
that  was  good  in  any  of  its  measures.  In  either  event, 
they  were  but  poorly  qualified  for  the  work  which  they 
had  in  hand ;  and  yet,  in  spite  of  the  prejudice  which 
occasionally  crops  out  even  in  trustworthy  WTitex'S  like 
Stoddard  and  Brackenridge,  it  is  evident  to  any  one 
who  will  take  the  trouble  to  read  between  the  lines,  that 
these  people  had  attained  to  a  degree  of  mental,  material, 
and  jjolitical  progress  which  compared  not  unfavorably 
with  the  early  stages  of  existence  in  the  communities  on 
the  other  side  of  the  Mississippi.  All  things  consid- 
ered, it  is  safe  to  say  that,  so  far  as  the  acts  of  the 
constituted  authorities  coidd  or  did  affect  the  lives  of 
the  colonists,  they  had  nothing  to  learn  from  their 
English-American  neighbors.  They  did  not,  it  is  true, 
have  to  pay  as  much  for  their  homes  and  farms,  contrib- 
ute out  of  their  scanty  earnings  to  the  maintenance  of 
the  priests,  or  of  the  magistrates  for  whom  they  had  but 


62  MISSOURI. 

little  use  ;  neither  were  they  called  on  to  tax  themselves 
to  any  great  extent  for  the  support  of  the  government. 
They  had  even  managed  to  get  along  quite  comfortably 
without  the  introduction  of  the  trial  by  jury  ;  and,  what 
some  of  the  early  writers  find  it  difiicult  to  understand, 
they  regai'ded  these  exemjjtions  as  positive  advantages. 
Whether,  alone  and  unaided,  they  could  have  edu- 
cated themselves  to  a  contrary  way  of  thinking,  is  a 
question  which  we  are  not  called  upon  to  consider. 
Such  a  thing  is  possible ;  and  it  is  even  possible  that 
the  English-American  settlers  who  had  crossed  the  Mis- 
sissippi to  escape  taxation  and  in  pursuit  of  cheap  lands 
might  have  been  foolish  enough  to  revolutionize  the 
province,  as  they  were  abundantly  able  to  do,  for  the 
purpose  of  reincurring  the  obligations  which  such,  a 
course  would  have  imposed ;  but  there  is  no  reason  for 
thinking  they  would  have  done  so,  though  the  contrary 
has  been  often  asserted  and  is  generally  believed.  All 
that  we  are  permitted  to  know  about  the  matter  is  that 
the  settlers  were  so  well  satisfied  with  their  form  of  gov- 
ernment, and  with  their  mode  of  life,  that  the  transfer 
of  the  colony,  in  1804,  to  the  United  States  was  a  source 
of  undisguised  regret  to  a  great  majority  of  the  Creoles, 
and  that  the  English- American  portion  of  the  population 
was  neither  unanimous  nor  enthusiastic  in  its  favor.^ 

^  "Indeed,  few  of  the  French  and  part  of  the  English- Ameri-  . 
cans  only  were  at  first  reconciled  to  the  change,  though   they 
never  manifested  any  discontent."  — Stoddard,  Sketches  of  Louis- 
iana, p.  311.     Philadelphia,  1812. 


CHAPTER  IV, 

THE   LOUISIAIJA   PURCHASE. 

In  seeking  for  the  causes  that  led  to  the  treaties  of 
1800  and  1803,  by  which  Louisiana  was  "  retroceded  " 
to  France  and  subsequently  sold  by  that  power  to  the 
United  States,  it  will  be  necessary  to  glance  briefly  at 
the  political  condition  of  Western  Euroi)e  as  it  then  was, 
and  to  note  the  Steps  by  which  the  English  colonies 
along  the  Atlantic  coast  had  become  welded  into  the 
United  States  of  America,  and  had  extended  their  wes- 
tern boundary  to  the  Mississippi  River. 

By  the  first  of  these  treaties,  known  to  history  as  the 
treaty  of  St.  Ildefonso,  and  concluded  on  the  1st  of  Oc- 
tober, 1800,  France  came  into  possession  of  Louisiana 
with  "  the  same  limits  that  it  now  has  in  the  hands 
of  Sjjain,  that  it  had  when  France  possessed  it,  and  such 
as  it  ought  to  have  after  the  treaties  subsequently  en- 
tered into  between  Spain  and  other  powers."  Ostensi- 
bly this  retrocession  was  made  in  return  for  the  province 
of  Tuscany,  which  was  to  be  erected  into  a  kingdom 
under  the  name  of  Etruria  and  handed  over  to  the  Duke 
of  Parma,  one  of  the  Spanish  princes  ;  but  in  reality, 
it  was  the  result  of  a  complication  of  affairs  in  which 
Spain  can  hardly  be  said  to  have  been  a  willing  actor. 
Under  any  circumstances,  such  a  cession  involved  a 
sacrifice  of  pride  and  prestige  which  must  have  been 
exceedingly  distasteful  to  a  proud  and  haughty  people, 


64  MISSOURI. 

and  in  the  present  instance,  it  was  made  more  objection- 
able by  the  fact  that,  in  many  quarters,  it  was  regarded 
as  a  miHtary  and  jjolitical  bkmder.  By  some  inexplic- 
able process,  the  Spanish  authorities  had  persuaded 
themselves  that  Louisiana  might  be  made  a  sort  of  bul- 
wark to  their  Mexican  possessions,  and  hence  the  tenac- 
ity with  which  they  clung  to  it  although  it  had  already 
brought  them  to  the  brink  of  a  war  witli  the  United 
States,  and  although  it  must,  if  the  policy  of  closing 
the  Mississippi  to  the  people  of  the  Ohio  valley  were 
persisted  in,  inevitably  hasten  the  very  result  which 
they  were  anxious  to  avoid.  For  these  reasons,  then, 
among  others,  it  is  permitted  us  to  believe  that  the  court 
of  Madrid  was  not  anxious  to  part  with  Louisiana,  and 
that  it  would  not  have  agreed  to  do  so,  but  for  the 
pressure  which  Bonaparte  knew  so  well  how  to  bring 
to  bear  ui)on  all  who  were  in  positions  to  help  or  hinder 
his  designs. 

At  this  time,  he  was  in  the  full  flush  of  his  Italian 
triumphs.  He  had  just  been  made  First  Consul  for  ten 
years,  and  he  was  intent  upon  schemes  for  advancing 
France  to  a  jiosition  in  naval  and  commercial  affairs 
which  would  be  commensurate  with  the  military  su- 
premacy he  had  reasserted  for  her  on  land.  To  do  this, 
colonies  were  regarded  as  absolutely  essential,  and  these 
France  did  not  have.  The  ill-advised  emancipation  of 
the  slaves  in  Hayti  had  handed  over  that  flourishing 
island  to  Toussaint  L'Ouverture  and  the  party  of  the 
blacks,  as  distinguished  from  that  of  the  whites  or  the 
mulattoes ;  and  of  all  her  other  possessions  in  Asia 
and  America,  the  English  had  left  her  but  little  that 
was  worth  having.  The  outlook  was  not  favorable,  but 
the    First  Consul,  in  nowise  daunted  by  the  prospect, 


THE  LOUISIANA  PURCHASE.  65 

made  up  his  mind  to  reconquer  Hayti  on  the  first  op- 
portunity, and  by  way  of  furnishing  that  colony  with  a 
depot  from  which  to  draw  suppHes  of  "  provisions,  cattle, 
and  wood,"  he  determined  to  reclaim  Louisiana. 

In  the  condition  in  wliich  France  then  was,  such  a 
course  would,  to-day,  be  looked  upon  as  suicidal,  but  at 
that  time  it  was  regarded  as  sound  policy  by  not  a  few 
of  those  who  conti'olled  the  destinies  of  Europe.  Even 
the  First  Consul  himself,  far-sighted  as  he  was,  seems 
only  to  have  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  truth,  recognized 
everywhere  twenty  five  years  later,  that  a  distant  colony 
was  "  an  element  of  weakness  to  a  jjeople  who  could  be 
shut  out  from  the  sea  on  the  outbreak  of  every  maritime 
war."  There  were  other  considerations  of  a  personal 
character,  that  had  their  weight  in  leading  him  to  adopt 
this  course.  He  knew  very  well  that  the  family  comjjact 
of  1762,  by  which  Louisiana  had  been  ceded  to  Spain, 
was  considered  a  great  mistake  by  the  merchants  of 
France,  and  he  was  satisfied  that  he  could  count  upon 
their  support  in  any  efforts  he  might  make  to  recover 
it.  He  seems  also  to  have  had  a  vague  notion  that  the 
possession  of  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi  would  enable 
him  to  exert  a  pressure  upon  the  people  of  the  Ohio 
valley  which  would,  with  a  little  judicious  management, 
bend  them  to  bis  will  and  thus  give  him  a  potential  voice 
in  North  American  affairs.  But  even  if  it  did  not  come 
up  to  his  expectations  in  each  and  every  one  of  these 
particulars,  he  fancied  that  in  some  possible  contingency 
it  might  furnish  him  with  a  base  of  operations  from 
wdiich  he  could  threaten  the  English  colonies  in  Canada 
or  the  West  Indies  ;  and  if  the  occasion  should  ever 
arise,  it  would  afford  him  a  position  from  which  he  could 
seize  Mexico  and   the    Spanish  possessions    in   Central 


66  MISSOURI. 

America.  ^Besides  these  advantages,  which  were  rather 
prospective  than  real,  he  hoped  to  find  here  the  means 
of  rewarding  the  officers  and  soldiers  whom  the  peace 
had  thrown  out  of  employment,  and  he  also  saw  in  it  a 
safe  and  convenient  outlet  for  certain  turbulent  sjiirits 
whom  he  might  wish  to  keep  at  a  distance  from  France. 

Influenced  by  these  considerations,  he  took  occasion 
to  open  negotiations  with  the  Spanish  cabinet  upon  this 
subject ;  and  skillfully  availing  himself  of  the  critical 
condition  of  the  relations  which  then  existed  between 
Spain  and  the  United  States,  he  found  no  difficulty  in 
convincing  the  Spanish  minister  that  it  was  to  the  in- 
terest of  his  country  to  retrocede  Louisiana  to  France. 
France,  it  was  urged,  was  the  friend  and  ally  of  Sjiain, 
and  in  her  hands  Louisiana  would  be  a  protection  to 
Mexico,  and  not  a  source  of  danger,  as  it  now  was. 
Powerful  as  this  motive  must  have  been,  it  was  supple- 
mented by  the  fact  that  the  prevailing  opinion  at  Mad- 
rid, at  that  time,  seems  to  have  been  that  she  would 
prove  a  less  dangerous  neighbor  than  the  United  States, 
as  she  was  not  a  colonizing  power,  the  experience  of  a 
hundred  and  fifty  years  having  demonstrated  her  in- 
ability to  maintain  a  successful  continental  possession. 
Unquestionably  these  considerations  had  their  weight, 
and  backed,  as  they  were,  by  the  imperious  will  and  vic- 
torious legions  of  Bonaparte,  they  were  too  powerful  to 
be  resisted.  Accordingly,  on  the  1st  of  October,  1800, 
the  treaty  of  St.  Ildefonso  was  concluded,  and  Louisiana 
became  once  more  a  French  colony. 

Thus  far,  everything  had  gone  on  smoothly.  Spain 
had  given  her  consent  to  the  retrocession,  somewhat 
unwillingly,  perhaps,  but  still  she  had  given  it ;  and  thus 
by    the    mei'e   stroke   of  a  pen,  the    First  Consul  had 


THE  LOUISIANA   PURCHASE.  67 

acquired  a  clear  title  to  a  domain  far  more  extensive 
than  France  itself.  To  take  possession  of  it,  however, 
was  quite  a  different  matter,  and  this  was  the  lesson 
which  he  was  now  to  learn.  England  was  the  mistress 
of  the  seas,  and  not  only  was  it  impossible  for  a  French 
fleet  to  move  without  her  permission,  but  it  was  quite 
within  her  power,  in  case  the  cession  of  Louisiana  be- 
came known,  to  land  a  force  at  New  Orleans  and  seize 
the  colony  before  it  had  been  formally  transferred  to  its 
new  owners.  Under  these  circumstances,  the  high  con- 
tracting parties  found  it  necessary  to  move  very  cau- 
tiously ;  and  hence  the  attempt  to  keep  the  terms  of  the 
treaty  and  even  its  existence  a  secret,  until  the  peace  of 
Amiens  once  more  gave  the  French  the  free  run  of  the 
ocean,  and  made  it  possible  for  the  First  Consul  to  pro- 
ceed openly  in  the  execution  of  his  plans  for  colonial 
aggrandizement.  When,  therefore,  in  the  autumn  of 
1801,  the  preliminaries  of  that  peace  were  agreed  upon 
in  London,  he  at  once  took  advantage  of  the  opportunity 
and  began  secretly  to  make  arrangements  for  the  occu- 
pation of  Hayti  and  Louisiana.  With  the  expedition 
sent  to  Hayti,  we  are  not  concerned.  It  sailed  in  the 
winter  of  1801-2,  before  the  conclusion  of  the  definitive 
treaty  of  peace  in  the  March  following,  and  except  in 
so  far  as  the  difficulties  and  disasters  which  it  encoun- 
tered may  have  influenced  the  First  Consul  in  his  deter- 
mination to  part  with  Louisiana,  it  does  not  come  within 
the  scope  of  our  investigation. 

The  second  of  these  expeditions  —  the  one  intended 
to  take  possession  of  Louisiana — was  organized  during 
the  ensuing  summer  and  with  the  same  secrecy,  but  its 
departure  was  delayed  by  a  misunderstanding  as  to  the 
interpretation  of  the  treaty  of  St.  Ildefonso,  France  con- 


68  MISSOURI. 

tending  that  the  Floridas  were  inchided  in  the  act  of 
cession,  whilst  Spain  maintained  that  they  were  not. 
When,  at  length,  after  some  months  of  contention,  this 
point  was  settled,  another  year  had  rolled  around,  and 
the  relations  hetween  France  and  England  had  become 
so  strained  that  the  order  for  the  expedition  to  sail  was 
countermanded,  and  the  troops  that  had  been  intended 
to  occupy  Louisiana  and  garrison  New  Orleans  were 
assigned  to  other  duties. 

In  the  mean  time,  notwithstanding  the  secrecy  with 
which  the  terms  of  this  treaty  had  been  guarded,  its 
purport  was  generally  suspected  in  diplomatic  circles. 
In  March,  1801,  Mr.  Rufus  King,  the  American  minis- 
ter to  England,  informed  Mr.  Secretary  Madison  of  the 
rumors  that  were  afloat  on  the  subject,  and  Mr.  R.  R. 
Livingston  was  at  once  sent  to  Paris,  with  instructions  to 
protest  against  a  measure  which  was  justly  regarded  as 
being  hostile  to  the  interests  of  the  United  States,  inas- 
much as  it  placed  a  strong  military  power  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Mississippi,  instead  of  a  weak  one  as  Spain  then 
was.  This  vigorous  action  brought  the  United  States 
prominently  forward,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  it 
was  their  hostility  to  the  measure,  joined  to  the  warlike 
attitude  assumed  by  England  some  months  later,  that 
determined  the  First  Consul  to  make  a  virtue  of  neces- 
sity and  sell  a  colony  which  he  could  not  hope  to  retain, 
even  if  he  were  permitted  to  take  possession  of  it. 

To  understand  the  part  which  the  United  States  were 
henceforth  to  play  in  this  transaction  and  the  reasons 
for  it,  we  shall  have  to  take  a  retrospective  glance,  and 
note  briefly  the  steps  which  had  bi'ought  them  to  the 
Mississippi  River,  and  to  the  very  doors  of  New  Orleans. 
In  doing  this  it  will  not  be  necessary  to  go  back  of  the 


THE  LOUISIANA   PURCHASE.  69 

treaty  of  1763,  by  which,  as  we  have  already  seen, 
France  divided  the  possessions  which  she  held  upon  the 
mainland  of  North  America,  between  Great  Britain  and 
Spain,  —  aU  on  the  east  side  of  the  Mississippi,  except 
the  city  of  New  Orleans  and  the  island  on  which  it  is 
situated,  being  ceded  to  the  former  power,  whilst  the 
latter  gained  New  Orleans  and  all  of  Louisiana  that 
was  situated  west  of  that  river.  At  the  same  time, 
Spain  surrendered  Florida  in  return  for  Havana  Avhich 
had  been  recently  taken  from  her,  so  that,  by  virtue  of 
these  treaties.  Great  Britain  was  now  the  sole  owner  of 
all  of  North  America  east  of  the  Mississippi,  excejit  the 
small  triangle  at  the  mouth  of  the  river,  which  is 
bounded  by  the  Mississippi  on  one  side,  the  Gulf  on 
another,  and  by  the  Iberville  and  Lakes  Maurepas  and 
Pontchartrain  on  the  third  or  north. 

In  the  same  year  in  which  she  came  into  possession 
of  all  this  broad  domain.  Great  Britain  divided  Florida 
into  two  provinces,  which  were  called,  respectively,  East 
and  West  Florida.  At  first  the  northern  limit  of  West 
Florida  was  fixed  at  a  line  extending  from  the  Missis- 
sippi to  the  Appalachicola  along  the  31st  degree  of  north 
latitude  ;  but  shortly  after,  in  order  to  expedite  the 
administration  of  justice  in  the  Natchez  district,  a  strip, 
a  hundred  miles  and  more  in  width,  along  its  entire 
northern  boundary,  was  added  to  West  Florida,  thus  ex- 
tending its  limits  in  that  direction  to  a  line  drawn  due 
east  from  the  mouth  of  the  Yazoo  River  to  the  Chatta- 
hoochee, one  of  the  main  branches  of  the  Appalachi- 
cola. 

Such  was  the  condition  of  affairs  when  the  revolt  of  the 
thirteen  American  colonies  made  another  revision  of  the 
map  necessary.     By  the  treaty  of  1783  between  Great 


70  MISSOURI. 

Britain  on  the  one  part  and  the  United  States  and  her 
allies,  Fi'ance  and  Spain,  on  the  other,  Great  Bi^italn 
acknowledged  the  independence  of  the  colonies,  and 
recognized  as  a  part  of  their  southern  boundary  a  line 
drawn  due  east  from  a  point  in  the  Mississippi  River, 
in  latitude  31°  north,  to  the  middle  of  the  Appalachi- 
cola ;  and  at  the  same  time  she  ceded  to  Spain  by  a 
separate  agreement  the  two  Floridas,  but  without  defin- 
ing their  northern  boundaries.  This  omission  gave  rise 
to  a  dispute  between  Spain  and  the  United  States  as  to 
their  respective  limits.  On  the  part  of  Spain  it  was 
contended  that  by  the  act  of  Great  Britain,  of  1764,  the 
northern  boundary  of  West  Florida  had  been  fixed  at 
the  line  running  due  east  from  the  mouth  of  the  Yazoo 
to  the  Chattahoochee,  and  that  all  south  of  that  line  had 
been  ceded  to  her  ;  whilst  on  the  other  hand,  the  United 
States  as  strenuously  maintained  that  the  act  fixing  and 
enlarging  the  limits  of  West  Florida  was  superseded  by 
the  recent  treaty,  which  extended  their  southern  bound- 
ary to  the  31st  degree  of  north  latitude,  a  hundred  and 
ten  miles  further  south  than  the  line  claimed  by 
Spain. 

Spain,  however,  had  possession  of  the  disputed  terri- 
tory by  right  of  conquest,  and  evidently  had  no  intention 
of  giving  it  up.  She  strengthened  her  garrisons  at 
Baton  Rouge  and  Natchez,  and  buUt  a  fort  at  Vicksburg, 
and  subsequently  one  at  New  Madrid,  on  the  Missouri 
side  of  the  Mississippi,  just  below  the  mouth  of  the  Ohio  ; 
and  of  the  latter  she  made  a  port  of  entry  where  vessels 
from  the  Ohio  were  obliged  to  land  and  declare  their 
cargoes.  She  even  denied  the  right  of  the  United  States 
to  the  region  between  the  Mississippi  and  the  Alleghany 
Mountains,  which  had  been  ceded  to  them  by  Great  Brit- 


THE  LOUISIANA  PURCHASE.  71 

ain  on  the  ground  that  the  conquests  made  by  Governor 
Galvez,  of  West  Florida,  and  by  Don  Eugenio  Pierre,^ 

The  following  is  tlie  account  of  this  expedition  :  — 
From  the  Madrid  Gazette  of  the  12th  March,  178G. 

Translation.  —  By  a  letter  from  the  commandant  general  of  the 
army  of  operations  at  the  Havana  and  govemour  of  Louisiana,  his 
majesty  has  advices,  that  a  detachment  of  sixty-five  militia  men, 
and  sixty  Indians  of  the  nations  Otaguos,  Sotu,  and  Putuatami, 
under  the  command  of  Don  Eugenio  Pierre,  a  captain  of  militia,  ac- 
companied by  Don  Carlos  Tayon,  a  sub-lieutenant  of  militia,  by 
Don  Luis  Chevalier,  a  man  well  versed  in  the  language  of  the  In- 
dians, and  by  their  great  chiefs  Eleturno  and  Naquigen,  which 
marched  the  2d  January,  1781,  from  the  town  of  St.  Luis  of  the 
Illinois,  had  possessed  themselves  of  the  post  of  St.  Joseph,  which 
the  English  occupied  at  two  hundred  and  twenty  leagues  distance 
from  that  of  the  above-mentioned  St.  Luis ;  having  suffered  in  so 
extensive  a  march,  and  so  rigorous  a  season,  the  greatest  incon- 
veniences from  cold  and  hunger,  exposed  to  continued  risks  from, 
the  country  being  possessed  by  savage  nations,  and  having  to  pass 
over  parts  covered  with  snow,  and  each  one  being  obliged  to  carry 
provision  for  his  own  subsistence,  and  various  merchandises  which 
were  necessary  to  content,  in  case  of  need,  the  barbarous  nations 
through  whom  they  were  obliged  to  cross.  The  commander,  by 
seasonable  negotiations  and  precautions,  prevented  a  considerable 
body  of  Indians,  who  were  at  the  devotion  of  the  English,  from 
opposing  this  expedition  ;  for  it  woiUd  otherwise  have  been  diffi- 
cult to  have  accomplished  the  taking  of  the  said  post.  They 
made  prisoners  of  the  few  English  they  found  in  it,  the  others 
having  perhaps  retired  in  consequence  of  some  prior  notice.  Don 
Eugenio  Pierre  took  possession,  in  the  name  of  the  king,  of  that 
place  and  its  dependencies,  and  of  the  river  of  the  Illinois ;  in 
consequence  whereof  the  standard  of  his  majesty  was  there  dis- 
played during  the  whole  time.  He  took  the  English  one,  and  de- 
livered it  on  his  arrival  at  St.  Luis  to  Don  Francisco  Cruzat,  the 
commandant  of  that  post. 

The  destruction  of  the  magazine  of  provisions  and  goods  which 
the  English  had  there  (the  greater  part  of  it  wliich  was  divided 
among  our  Indians  and  those  who  lived  at  St.  Joseph  as  had  been 


72  MISSOURI. 

of  Fort  St.  Joseph,  "  near  the  sources  of  the  Illinois," 
had  vested  the  title  to  all  this  country  in  her ;  and  she 
insisted  that  what  she  did  not  own  was  possessed  hy  the 
Indians,  and  could  not  therefore  belong  to  the  United 
States.  Even  as  late  as  1795,  she  claimed  to  have 
bought  from  the  Chickasaws  the  bluffs  which  bear  their 
name,  and  which  are  situated  on  the  east  bank  of  the 
Mississippi  some  distance  north  of  the  most  northerly 
boundary  ever  assigned  by  Great  Britain  to  West 
Florida. 

Here,  then,  was  cause  for  "  a  very  pretty  quarrel,"  and 
to  add  to  the  ill  feeling  which  grew  out  of  it,  Spain  de- 
nied the  right  of  the  people  of  the  United  States  to  the 
"free  navigation  of  the  Mississippi,"  —  a  right  which 
had  been  conceded  to  them  by  Great  Britain  with  all  the 
formalities  with  which  she  had  received  it  from  France. 
Whether  it  was  competent  for  her,  thus,  to  hand  over  to 
a  third  party  the  right  which  she  undoubtedly  had  of 
passing,  at  will,  through  this  portion  of  the  dominions  of 
Spain  is  a  point  about  which  opinions  may  differ.  One 
thing,  however,  is  certain,  that  no  self-respecting  people, 
powerful  enough  to  prevent  the  exercise  of  such  a  right, 

offered  them  in  case  they  did  not  oppose  our  troops)  was  not  the 
only  advantage  resulting'  from  the  success  of  this  expedition,  for 
thereby  it  became  impossible  for  the  English  to  execute  their  plan 
of  attacking  the  fort  of  St.  Luis  of  the  Illinois,  and  it  also  served 
to  intimidate  these  savage  nations,  and  oblige  them  to  promise  to 
remain  neuter,  which  they  do  at  present. 

When  yon  consider  the  ostensible  object  of  this  expedition,  the 
distance  of  it,  the  formalities  ^vith  which  the  place,  the  country, 
and  the  river  were  taken  possession  of  in  the  name  of  his  Catho- 
liek  majesty,  I  am  persuaded  it  will  not  be  necessary  for  me  to 
swell  this  letter  with  remarks  that  would  occur  to  a  reader  of  far 
less  penetration  than  yourseK.  —  Secret  Journal,  vol.  iv.  (U.  S. 
Doc.  205.) 


77/ A'   LOUISIANA   PURCHASE.  73 

would  ever  suffer  it  to  pass  unchallenged.  To  this  ex- 
tent, then,  it  must  be  conceded  that  Spain  occujned  solid 
ground,  and  in  the  present  instance  her  position  was 
strengthened  by  the  fact  that,  strictly  speaking,  the  free 
navigation  of  the  Mississippi  was  not  the  point  in  dis- 
pute. Of  itself,  this  phrase  meant  nothing  tangible,  for 
a  sea-going  vessel,  as  then  constructed,  could  not  reach 
the  Ohio ;  neither  could  a  flatboat,  such  as  the  people 
of  Kentucky  generally  used  for  sending  their  surjilus 
produce  down  the  river,  navigate  the  ocean.  What  was 
needed  to  make  the  right  of  any  value  to  the  people  of 
the  Ohio  valley  was  the  additional  right  to  take  their 
produce  into  a  Spanish  port,  New  Orleans,  and  either 
sell  it  then  and  there,  or  else  store  it,  subject  to  certain 
conditions,  until  such  time  as  it  suited  them  to  transfer 
it  to  sea-going  vessels.  This  right  Spain  would  not  con- 
cede ;  and  as  the  people  of  the  Ohio  valley  were  deter- 
mined to  have  it,  cost  what  it  might,  it  brought  on  a 
series  of  intrigues  between  the  Spanish  governors  of 
Louisiana  and  certain  influential  citizens  west  of  the 
Alleghanies  which  threatened  the  stability  of  the  Amer- 
ican Union  almost  before  it  was  formed,  and  ultimately 
led  to  the  purchase  of  Louisiana,  and  to  the  sectional 
struggle  for  political  power  which,  aligning  itself  on  dif- 
ferent issues,  finally  culminated  in  the  election  of  Lin- 
coln and  the  war  of  secession.^ 

At  length  in  1795,  after  ten  years  of  procrastination, 
the  prospect  of  a  European  war,  in  which  Spain  and 
England  were  to  be  ranged  on  different  sides,  and  the 

^  "  We  agreed  and  lamented  the  one  inevitable  consequence  of 
the  annexation  of  Louisiana  to  the  Union  would  be  to  diminish 
the  relative  weight  and  influence  of  the  Northern  section."  John 
Quincy  Adams  in  New  England  Federalism,  p.  148.    Boston,  1877. 


74  MISSOURI. 

necessity  which  this  imposed  on  the  former  power  of 
guarding  her  American  possessions  by  the  interposition 
of  a  neutral  and  friendly  state  between  upper  Louisiana 
and  Canada,  brought  about  an  agreement  between  Spain 
and  the  United  States  which  resulted  in  the  treaty  of 
Madrid.  By  the  terms  of  this  treaty,  Spain  recognized 
the  31st  degree  of  north  latitude  as  the  boundary  be- 
tween the  United  States  and  West  Florida ;  and  she 
agreed  to  permit  the  people  of  the  United  States  to  use 
the  port  of  New  Orleans  as  a  place  of  deposit  for  their 
merchandise  and  effects,  and  to  export  the  same  free 
of  all  duty  or  charge  except  a  reasonable  consideration 
to  be  paid  for  storage  and  other  incidental  expenses. 
This  agreement  was  to  be  in  force  for  three  years,  at 
the  end  of  which  time,  his  Catholic  majesty  "  promised 
either  to  continue  this  permission,  if  he  found  during 
that  time  that  it  was  not  prejudicial  to  the  interests  of 
Spain,  or  if  he  should  not  agree  to  continue  it  there, 
he  agreed  to  assign,  on  another  part  of  the  banks  of  the 
Mississippi,  an  equivalent  establishment."  At  the  ex- 
piration of  the  three  years,  the  agreement  was  contin- 
ued by  tacit  consent,  and  it  remained  in  force  until 
October,  1802,  when  the  intendant.  Morales,  in  oppo- 
sition to  the  advice  of  the  governor,  canceled  it,  and  re- 
fused to  name  any  other  place  of  deposit,  as  the  Ameri- 
cans contended  he  was  bound  to  do  under  the  treaty. 
This  ill-judged  act  worked  an  injury  to  both  parties.  It 
caused  a  scarcity  of  provisions  at  New  Orleans,  and  it 
effectually  shut  out  the  people  of  the  Western  States 
from  a  market  for  their  surplus  produce,  thus  provoking 
throughout  all  that  region  a  storm  of  indignation  not 
only  against  Spain,  but  also  against  France ;  for  by  this 
time  the  fact  of  the  retrocession  was  known,  and  it  was 


THE  LOUISIANA  PURCHASE.  75 

generally  believed  that  the  right  of  deposit  would  not 
have  been  revoked  except  at  her  request. 

At  this  time  the  population  of  the  Ohio  valley 
amounted  to  about  six  hundred  thousand  souls,  and  they 
were  in  no  mood  to  submit  to  a  proceeding  which  they 
regarded  as  being  inimical  to  their  interests,  as  indeed  it 
was,  and  also  as  a  violation  of  treaty  obligations,  which 
was  a  matter  of  some  doubt,  "  the  law  of  nature  "  to 
the  contrary  notwithstanding.  *'  The  Mississijipi,"  they 
said,  "  is  ours  by  the  law  of  nature.  .  .  .  Its  mouth  is 
the  only  issue  ...  to  our  waters,  and  we  wish  to  use  it 
for  oar  vessels.  No  power  in  the  world  shall  deprive 
us  of  this  right.  ...  If  our  liberty  in  this  matter  is 
disputed,  nothing  shall  prevent  our  taking  possession  of 
the  capital,  and  when  we  are  once  masters  of  it,  we 
shall  know  how  to  maintain  ourselves  there.  If  Con- 
gress refuses  us  effectual  protection,  if  it  forsakes  us, 
we  will  adopt  the  measures  which  our  safety  requires, 
even  if  they  endanger  the  peace  of  the  Union  and  our 
connection  with  the  other  States.  No  protection,  no 
allegiance." 

In  November,  Mr.  Madison  wrote  to  the  American 
minister  at  Madrid  to  the  effect  that  the  proclamation 
of  Morales,  prohibiting  the  right  of  deposit  at  New  Or- 
leans, was  a  direct  and  palpable  violation  of  the  treaty 
of  1795,  and  expressed  the  hope  that  the  Spanish  gov- 
ernment would  neither  lose  a  moment  in  countermand- 
ing it,  nor  hesitate  to  repair  every  damage  which  might 
result  from  it.  You  are  aware,  he  said,  of  the  sensibil- 
ity of  our  Western  citizens  to  such  an  occurrence ;  and 
this  sensibility,  he  added,  is  justified  by  the  interests 
they  have  at  stake.  "  The  Mississippi  to  thevi  is  everij- 
thing.     It  is  the  Hudson,  the  Delatvare,  the  Potomac, 


76  MJSsorRL 

and  all  the  navigable  rivers  of  the  Atlantic  States, 
formed  into  one  stream.  ...  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the 
intendant  will  be  led  to  see  the  error  which  he  has 
committed,  and  to  correct  it  before  a  very  great  share 
of  its  mischief  will  have  happened.  Should  he  prove 
as  obstinate  as  he  has  been  ignorant  or  wicked,  nothing 
can  temper  the  irritation  and  indignation  of  the  West- 
ern country  but  a  persuasion  that  the  energy  of  their 
government  will  obtain  from  that  of  Spain  the  most  am- 
ple redress."  Mr.  Livingston  held  much  the  same  lan- 
guage in  Paris,  and  made  good  use  of  the  hostile  out- 
burst by  way  of  enforcing  the  proposition  which  he  had 
previously  submitted  to  the  French  cabinet  for  the  pur- 
chase of  New  Orleans  and  the  Floridas.  Congress,  too, 
took  up  the  matter,  and  in  February,  1803,  after  a 
lengthy  debate,  resolutions  of  a  decidedly  belligerent 
character  were  adopted. 

Before  the  news  of  this  action  could  reach  Europe, 
the  Spanish  king  "  had  disapproved  of  the  order  of  Mo- 
rales, prohibiting  the  introduction  of  goods,  wares,  and 
merchandise  from  the  United  States  into  the  port  of 
New  Orleans,  and  had  ordered  that  the  United  States 
should  continue  to  enjoy  the  right  of  deposit  there,  but 
without  prejudice  to  his  right  of  substituting  some 
other  spot  on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi,"  as  provided 
in  the  treaty  of  Madrid.  Unquestionably  this  was  a 
politic  move,  and  a  few  years  earlier  it  would  have 
been  hailed  as  a  harbinger  of  peace  by  the  people  of 
the  Ohio  valley  ;  but  of  late,  events  had  moved  rapidly 
both  in  Europe  and  America,  and  the  time  had  gone  by 
when  the  destiny  of  Louisiana  could  be  affected  by  any- 
thing that  Spain  might  or  might  not  do.  The  fact  of 
the  retrocession,  hitherto  jealously   guarded,  was  now 


THE  LOUISIANA  PURCHASE.  77 

openly  proclaimed,  and  P^ngland,  armed  for  the  struggle 
with  France  which  had  now  become  inevitable,  stood 
ready  to  seize  the  mouth  of  the  Mississippi  on  the  fir- 
ing of  the  first  gun.  This  was  well  known  to  the  First 
Consul,  and,  no  doubt,  it  decided  him  ;  for  whilst  as  a 
matter  of  fact  he  could  afford  to  ignore  the  protest  of 
as  weak  a  power  as  the  United  States  then  was,  and 
probably  would  have  done  so,  yet  with  the  sword  and 
purse  of  England  in  the  scale  against  him,  the  conditions 
were  changed,  and  he  saw,  at  once,  that  the  coveted 
prize  had  gone  from  him  forever.  Resolved,  however, 
that  what  was  France's  loss  should  not  be  England's 
gain,  and  being  in  sore  need  of  money,  he  determined  to 
sell  not  only  New  Orleans,  but  the  entire  colony,  and 
Talleyrand  was  instructed  to  sound  the  American  min- 
ister on  the  subject.  Accordingly  on  the  11th  of  April, 
1803,  he  astonished  Mr.  Livingston,  whose  modest  de- 
sires had  scarcely  reached  beyond  New  Orleans,  ])y 
askinfj  him  how  much  he  would  irive  for  the  whole  of 
Louisiana  ?  Not  being  prepared  to  name  a  definite 
sum  or  even  to  negotiate  for  the  entire  colony,  he  an- 
swered twenty  millions,  "  provided  our  citizens  were 
paid  for  the  losses  inflicted  on  their  commei'ce  by  French 
privateers."  This  was  pronounced  too  little,  and  Mr. 
Livingston  then  proposed  to  defer  the  further  con- 
sideration of  the  matter  until  after  the  arrival  of  Mr. 
Monroe,  who  was  daily  expected  in  Paris,  and  who  was 
specially  charged  by  President  Jefferson  to  assist  in  this 
negotiation.  Fortunately  Mr.  Monroe  arrived  at  this 
time,  and  he  and  Mr.  Livingston  at  once  took  up  the 
negotiation.  After  a  little  finessing  as  to  the  price  be- 
tween them  and  M.  Barbe-Marbois,  the  French  repre- 
sentative, the  terms  Avere  agreed  on,  and  the  treaty  was 
concluded  on  the  30th  of  April,  1803. 


78  MISSOURI. 

By  it  the  United  States  obtained  "  Louisiana,  witli  all 
its  rights  and  appurtenances  as  fully  and  in  the  same 
manner  as  they  had  been  acquired  by  the  French  Re- 
public from  Sjjain,  on  condition  that  the  Americans 
should  pay  to  France  eighty  millions  of  francs,  twenty 
millions  of  which  were  to  be  used  in  payment  of  what 
was  due  by  France  to  the  citizens  of  the  United  States." 
Certain  commercial  advantages  were  also  conceded  to 
France ;  and  in  Article  III.,  written  by  Bonaparte  him- 
self, it  was  stipulated  that  "  the  inhabitants  of  the  ceded 
territory  shall  be  incorporated  in  the  Union  of  the  United 
States,  and  admitted  as  soon  as  possible,  according  to 
the  principles  of  the  Federal  Constitution,  to  the  enjoy- 
ment of  all  the  rights,  advantages,  and  immunities  of 
citizens  of  the  United  States  ;  and  in  the  mean  time  they 
shall  be  maintained  and  protected  in  the  free  enjoy- 
ment of  their  liberty,  property,  and  the  religion  which 
they  profess." 

As  soon  as  the  terms  of  this  treaty  became  known, 
Spain  protested  against  it,  on  the  ground  that  France 
had  no  right  to  make  the  sale,  because,  first,  she  had 
agreed  never  to  alienate  the  colony  ;  and,  secondly,  be- 
cause her  own  title  was  not  yet  complete,  owing  to  the 
failure  on  her  part  to  secure  the  recognition  of  the  king 
of  Etruria  by  the  cabinets  of  London  and  St.  Peters- 
burg. In  reply,  Mr.  Madison  contended  that  the  prom- 
ise "  never  to  alienate  "  formed  no  part  of  the  original 
treaty  between  France  and  Spain,  and  that  if  it  had 
done  so  it  would  not  affect  the  purchase  by  the  United 
States,  which  had  been  made  in  good  faith,  and  in  igno- 
rance of  any  such  understanding.  He  also  called  atten- 
tion to  the  fact  that,  under  date  of  May  4th,  Spain  had, 
herself,  referred  the  United  States  to  France  as   being 


THE   LOUISIANA   PURCHASE.  79 

the  only  power  that  could  convey  this  territory,  and  he 
added  somewhat  sarcastically  that  if  any  further  evi- 
dence were  needed  as  to  the  validity  of  the  French  title, 
it  might  be  found  in  the  orders  of  the  king  of  Spain, 
transferring  that  colony  to  France. 

To  this  statement  on  the  part  of  the  United  States, 
there  could  be  no  satisfactory  reply  ;  and  on  the  10th  of 
February,  1804,  the  Spanish  minister,  in  a  letter  to  Mr. 
Pincknej',  denied  that  he  had  given  any  order  to  oppose 
the  transfer  of  Louisiana,  and  declared  that  '•  his  maj- 
esty thought  proper  to  renounce  his  protest  against  the 
alienation  of  Louisiana  by  France."  What  the  French 
government  thought  of  the  objections  brought  forward 
by  the  Spanish  court  may  be  inferred  from  the  letter  of 
the  French  charge  at  Washington,  dated  October  14, 
1803,  in  which  he  announced  that  as  soon  as  the  rati- 
fications were  exchanged,  "  he  would  proceed  without 
delay  ...  to  the  delivery  of  the  colony  to  the  persons 
whom  the  President  of  the  United  States  shall  appoint 
to  take  possession  of  it."  In  spite,  however,  of  the  har- 
mony which  prevailed  between  the  two  powers  that 
were  most  directly  concerned,  the  protest  of  Spain  was 
taken  advantage  of  by  the  opponents  of  Mr.  Jefferson's 
administration,  and  made  one  of  the  grounds  upon 
which  they  urged  the  rejection  of  the  treaty.  It  proved 
of  no  avail,  for,  as  John  Quincy  Adams  subsequently 
truly  said,  "  Notwithstanding  the  objections  and  appre- 
hensions of  many  individuals,  of  many  wise,  able,  and 
excellent  men  in  various  parts  of  the  Union,  yet  such 
is  the  public  favor  attending  the  transaction  which  com- 
menced by  the  negotiation  of  this  treaty,  and  which,  I 
hope,  will  terminate  in  our  full,  undisturbed,  and  undis- 
puted possession  of  the  ceded  territory,  that  I  firmly 


80  MISSOURI. 

believe  If  an  amendment  to  the  Constitution,  amply  suf- 
ficient for  the  accomplishment  of  everything  for  vi^hich 
we  have  contracted,  shall  be  proposed,  as  I  think  it 
ought,  it  will  be  adopted  by  the  legislature  of  every 
State  in  the  Union."  This  course,  however,  was  not 
thought  necessary  by  the  friends  of  the  measure.  The 
constitutional  objections  to  which  Mr.  Adams  referred, 
and  which  were  shared,  to  some  extent,  by  both  Jeffer- 
son and  Madison,  were  brushed  aside  with  character- 
istic disregard  ;  and  on  the  26th  of  October,  1803,  a 
few  days  after  the  ratification  of  the  treaty,  an  act  to 
enable  the  President  to  take  possession  of  the  ceded 
territory  was  passed  in  the  Senate  by  a  vote  of  26  to  6 ; 
and  on  the  28th  it  was  carried  in  the  House  by  a  vote 
of  89  to  23.  On  the  29th  of  the  same  month,  the  House 
passed  a  bill  authorizing  the  creation  of  a  stock  to  the 
amount  of  eleven  million  two  hundred  and  fifty  thou- 
sand dollars,  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  this  treaty 
into  effect,  and  when,  on  the  3d  of  November,  1803,  it 
came  before  the  Senate,  Mr.  Adams,  rising  superior  to 
sectional  considerations,  was  found  side  by  side  with 
Breckenridge,  of  Kentucky,  among  its  stoutest  sup- 
porters. 

With  the  adoption  of  this  measure,  congressional 
action  upon  the  subject  was  at  an  end,  and  it  now  only 
remained  for  the  United  States  to  take  possession  of  the 
territory  which  they  had  purchased.  This  was  done 
without  difficulty.  On  the  30th  of  November  the  Span- 
ish authorities  at  New  Orleans  handed  over  the  colony  to 
Laussat,  the  French  representative,  and  on  the  20th  of 
December  following,  he  formally  transferred  it  to  Gen- 
eral "Wilkinson  and  Governor  Claiborne,  of  Mississippi, 
who  were  authorized  to    receive  it  on  the  part  of  the 


THE  LOUISIANA  PURCHASE.  81 

United  States.  When  the  French  flag  that  was  floating 
in  the  square  was  hauled  down  and  the  American  flag 
was  run  up,  *'  a  group  of  American  citizens,  who  stood 
at  the  corner  of  the  square,  waved  their  hats  in  token 
of  respect  for  their  country's  flag,  and  a  few  of  them 
greeted  it  with  their  voices."  No  emotion,  it  is  said, 
was  manifested  by  any  other  portion  of  the  assemblage, 
unless  the  tears  which,  according  to  another  account, 
were  shed  on  the  occasion  shoidd  be  taken  as  an  index 
of  the  feeUngs  of  those  who  witnessed  the  ceremony. 

With  but  little  change,  save  in  the  actors,  this  scene 
was  repeated  on  the  9th  of  March,  1804,  in  the  then 
village  of  St.  Louis.  On  that  day,  the  American  troops 
crossed  the  river  from  Cahokia,  and  Don  Carlos  Dehault 
Delassus  delivered  upper  Louisiana  to  Captain  Amos 
Stoddard,  of  the  United  States  Army,  who  was  com- 
missioned to  receive  it  on  behalf  of  France.  The  next 
day  he  transferred  it  to  the  United  States,  and  thus  put 
an  end  to  the  rule  of  Spain  in  the  valley  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi, which,  counting  from  the  landing  of  Ulloa  at 
New  Orleans,  had  lasted  thirty-eight  years. 


CHAPTER  V. 

LOUISIANA    TERRITORY  :     1804    TO    1812. 

Ok  the  26th  of  March,  1804,  only  about  two  weeks 
after  Captain,  or,  to  give  him  the  title  by  which  he  is 
better  known,  Major  Stoddard  took  command  at  St. 
Louis,  and  in  evident  anticipation  of  that  event.  Presi- 
dent Jefferson  approved  of  the  act  of  Congress  by 
which  Louisiana  was  divided  into  two  parts,  and  all 
north  of  the  33d  parallel  of  north  latitude  was  formed 
into  a  district,  and  styled  the  District  of  Louisiana. 
For  judicial  and  administrative  purposes  this  district, 
or  upper  Louisiana  as  we  shall  continue  to  call  it,  was 
attached  to  the  territory  of  Indiana,  and  in  October  of 
that  year  the  governor  and  judges  of  that  territory  pre- 
pared a  series  of  ordinances,  and  inaugurated  the  new 
government  within  the  district,  thereby  relieving  Major 
Stoddard  from  the  anomalous  position  which  he  had 
hitherto  held  of  first  civil  commandant  of  upper  Louis- 
iana, under  the  appointment  of  Governor  Claiborne,  of 
Mississippi,  with  all  the  powers  and  prerogatives  of  a 
Spanish  lieutenant-governor. 

To  that  portion  of  the  act  which  attached  the  district 
to  Lidiana,  as  well  as  to  those  clauses  which  declared 
all  grants  of  lands  made  subsequent  to  the  treaty  of 
St.  Ildefonso  to  be  void  and  of  no  effect,  and  which 
related  to  the  prospective  removal  of  the  Indians  from 
the  east  side  of  the  Mississippi  to  the  west,  the  people 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  83 

o£  upper  Louisiana  were  violently  opposed  ;  and  in  a 
remonstrance  signed  on  the  29th  of  September,  1804, 
by  "  Representatives  elected  by  the  Freemen  of  their 
respective  districts  in  the  District  of  Louisiana,"  they 
prayed  for  the  repeal  of  the  act,  and  petitioned  for  the 
erection  of  the  district  into  a  territory  of  the  second 
grade,  the  rank  to  which  their  numbers  entitled  them. 
They  also  claimed  the  right,  under  the  treaty,  of  im- 
porting slaves  into  the  district,  which  was  prohibited  in 
the  territory  of  Oi'leans,  as  lower  Louisiana  was  now 
called,  but  which  had  not  been  denied  to  them  ;  and 
they  asked  that  "  funds  should  be  appropriated  for  the 
support,  and  lands  set  apart  or  bought  for  the  building 
and  maintaining  of  a  French  and  English  school  in  each 
county,  and  for  the  building  of  a  seminary  of  learning, 
where  not  only  the  French  and  English  languages,  but 
likewise  the  dead  languages,  mathematics,  mechanics, 
natural  and  moral  philosophy,  and  the  principles  of  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  should  be  taught." 

Of  the  fifteen  signers  of  this  "  Remonstrance  and 
Petition,"  as  it  was  termed,  eight  were  unquestionably  of 
French  extraction  —  a  proof,  if  any  were  needed,  of  the 
ease  with  which  they  adopted  the  methods  of  their  neigh- 
bors from  the  other  side  of  the  river.  On  the  4th  of 
January,  1805,  this  petition  was  presented  in  the  lower 
house  of  Congress,  and  was  referred  to  a  committee 
which  reported,  on  the  25th  of  the  same  month,  a  reso- 
lution declaring  that  "  provision  ought  to  be  made,  by 
law,  for  extending  to  the  inhabitants  of  Louisiana  the 
right  of  self-government,"  though  with  singular  incon- 
sistency they  accompanied  the  resolution  by  a  number 
of  so-called  "  wise  and  salutary  restrictions  "  as  to  the 
subjects  upon  which  freedom  of  action  was  to  be  allowed- 


84  MISSOURI. 

This  report  was  adopted,  and  a  committee,  of  which 
John  Randolph  was  chairman,  was  appointed  to  draw 
up  an  act  in  accordance  with  its  provisions  ;  but  before 
they  could  report,  a  bill  was  received  from  the  Senate 
which  erected  the  district  into  a  territory  of  the  first  or 
lowest  grade,  and  changed  its  title  from  the  District  to 
the  Territory  of  Louisiana.  This  bill  was  at  once  passed, 
and  on  the  3d  of  March,  1805,  it  received  the  signature 
of  President  Jefferson  and  became  a  law,  though  it  was 
not  to  go  into  effect  until  the  4th  of  the  July  following. 
By  it,  the  President  was  empowered  to  appoint  a  gov- 
ernor and  three  judges,  who  were  to  act  together  in  a 
legislative  capacity,  and  who  were  authorized  to  adopt 
such  regulations  as  they  might  deem  proper  for  the 
government  of  the  territory,  subject  of  course  to  the  ap- 
proval of  Congress.  No  mention  is  made  in  the  act  of 
the  land  grants  of  the  French  and  Spanish  commandants, 
nor  is  there  any  reference  to  the  removal  of  the  Indians 
to  the  west  side  of  the  Mississippi,  the  two  measures  in 
which  the  people  of  the  territory  were  most  interested. 

So  far  as  the  Indians  were  concerned,  it  was  not  per- 
haps necessary  that  there  should  have  been  any  action, 
at  this  time,  as  the  intentions  of  the  general  govern- 
ment in  this  respect  had  been  made  sufficiently  mani- 
fest, during  the  preceding  autumn,  by  a  treaty  in  which 
the  Sacs  and  Foxes  had  relinquished  some  thrte  mill- 
ion acres  of  land  situated  immediately  north  of  the  Mis- 
souri and  in  the  angle  formed  by  the  junction  of  that 
stream  with  the  Mississippi.  In  regard  to  the  land 
grants,  however,  there  were  no  such  assurances ;  and  it 
was  not  until  April,  1814,  that  an  act  was  passed  con- 
firming all  claims  made  "  by  virtue  of  incomplete  French 
or  Spanish  grants    or   concessions,  or  any  warrant,  or 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  OO 

order  of  survey  which  was  granted  prior  to  the  10th  of 
March,  1804,"  the  day  on  which  the  United  States  took 
formal  possession  of  U2)per  Louisiana. 

Exactly  why  this  just  and  politic  measure  was  so  long 
delayed  is  a  question  which  it  is  useless  now  to  discuss. 
Possibly,  it  may  have  been  due  to  an  unwillingness  on 
the  part  of  the  United  States  to  admit  the  right  of  Spain 
to  dispose  of  any  portion  of  the  soil  of  Louisiana  during 
the  time  that  she  continued  to  hold  it,  after  the  cession 
to  France  and  before  the  final  transfer  to  themselves, 
that  is,  from  October  1,  1800,  to  March  10,  1804  ;  or  it 
may  have  been  the  result  of  certain  well-grounded  suspi- 
cions as  to  the  fraudulent  character  of  some  of  the  grants 
made  by  the  last  two  Spanish  lieutenant-governors  of 
upper  Louisiana.  In  either  event,  it  was  a  mistake, 
for  as  matters  turned  out  it  would  have  been  productive 
of  less  harm  if  the  government  had,  in  the  first  place, 
submitted  to  the  small  loss  with  which  it  was  threatened, 
instead  of  trying  to  save  a  few  thousand  acres  of  land 
by  delaying  the  confirmation  of  these  grants  and  there- 
by prolonging  the  period  of  "  alarm  and  apprehension  " 
which,  we  are  told,  prevailed  very  generally  throughout 
the  district  in  regard  to  these  claims. 

That  this  delay,  or  rather  the  uncertainty  of  which 
it  was,  in  some  measure,  the  cause,  may  have  led  a 
number  of  the  holders  of  these  concessions,  and  of  the 
entries  made  under  them,  to  dispose  of  their  claims  at 
2)rices  that  were  merely  nominal  is  very  probable ;  but 
that  it  induced  "  many  families  to  abandon  the  country," 
as  was  asserted  on  the  floor  of  Congress,  is  believed  to 
be  a  bit  of  exaggeration,  excusable,  perhaps,  in  view  of 
the  end  sought  to  be  obtained,  but  hardly  to  be  taken 
as  the  literal  statement  of  a  truth.     Indeed,  the  evidence 


86  MISSOURI. 

all  seems  to  point  the  other  way  ;  for  upon  examination 
it  will  be  found  that  in  a  majority  of  the  thirteen  hun- 
dred and  forty-two  confirmations  made  prior  to  January, 
1813,  the  claims  were  still  in  the  hands  of  the  original 
holders  of  the  concessions  or  of  their  immediate  repre- 
sentatives ;  and  the  fact  that  in  1810  the  population 
amounted  to  over  twenty  thousand,  about  double  the 
number  it  was  estimated  to  have  been  when  Major  Stod- 
dard took  possession  of  the  district,  indicates  beyond  all 
cavil  that  the  number  of  families  that  had  come  into  the 
territory  during  this  interval  was  largely  in  excess  of 
those  that  had  quitted  it. 

In  spite,  however,  of  the  silence  of  this  act  in  re- 
gard to  these  titles,  and  although  it  stopped  short  of 
what  the  people  of  the  district  thought  they  had  a  right 
to  expect  in  the  way  of  territorial  advancement,  it  was  a 
steji  in  the  right  direction.  It  did  not,  it  is  true,  allow 
the  citizens  of  the  newly  formed  territory  to  choose 
their  own  officers,  frame  their  own  laws,  or  do  much 
else  that  a  self-governing  community  is  usually  supposed 
to  do  ;  but  it  gave  them  officers  whose  field  of  duty  was 
limited  to  the  territory ;  and,  theoretically,  it  made  of 
that  territory  a  sort  of  preparatory  school,  in  which 
the  inhabitants  were  to  take  their  first  lessons  in  the 
science  of  self-government,  though,  practically,  except 
in  the  introduction  of  the  trial  by  jury,  it  made  but  few 
changes  either  in  the  laws  or  in  the  manner  in  which 
they  were  administered. 

Under  the  circumstances  this  was  no  doubt  the  best 
thing  that  could  have  been  done.  The  experiences  of  a 
large  minority  of  the  citizens  of  the  territory,  accustomed 
as  they  had  been  to  the  summary  methods  of  the  Spanish 
commandants,  was  hardly  of  a  character  to  fit  them  for 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  87 

some  of  the  duties  that  were  now  to  devolve  upon  them, 
and  though  they  adapted  themselves  to  the  new  order  of 
things  with  marvelous  ease  and  rapidity,  yet  our  fathers, 
wiser,  perhajjs,  in  their  generation  than  we  have  been  in 
ours,  appear  to  have  been  of  the  opinion  that  a  certain 
amount  of  training  was  not  a  bad  preparation  for  the  re- 
sponsibilities of  citizenship.  Accordingly  they  assigned 
Louisiana  to  a  position  in  the  first  or  lowest  grade  of 
territories,  and  not  in  the  second,  as  was  expected  and 
desired. 

Under  this  new  regime  the  fii"st  governor  was  General 
James  Wilkinson,  and  with  him  were  associated,  the  one 
as  chief  justice  and  the  other  as  secretary,  J.  B.  C. 
Lucas,  a  Frenchman  by  birth  and  a  former  member  of 
Congress  from  Pennsylvania,  and  Dr.  Joseph  Browne, 
of  New  York,  who  is  said  to  have  been  appointed  upon 
"  the  special  and  single  recommendation  of  Aaron  Burr," 
whose  brother-in-law  he  was. 

Wilkinson  at  this  time  stood  high  in  the  favor  of  the 
authorities  at  Washington,  and  though  the  suspicious 
character  of  the  dealings  which  he  had  formerly  carried 
on  with  the  Spanish  officials  in  lower  Louisiana  must 
have  been  well  known,  yet  he  seems  to  have  retained  the 
confidence  of  Mr.  Jefferson  and  his  cabinet  to  the  very 
end.  He  was,  if  we  may  credit  Postmaster  Genei"al 
Granger,  "  one  of  the  most  agreeable,  best  informed,  most 
genteel,  moderate,  and  sensible  Republicans  in  the  na- 
tion ;  "  and  if  to  this  be  added  his  high  military  rank 
and  his  familiarity  with  border  life  and  Indian  affairs,  it 
would  seem  as  if  he  nuist  have  been  almost  an  ideal  man 
for  the  place.  And  yet,  notwithstanding  these  qualifi- 
cations, real  and  supposed,  his  career  as  governor  was  a 
failure  ;  not  that  he  did  anything  in  his  official  capacity 


88  MISSOURI. 

that  was  positively  harmful  to  the  people  of  the  territory, 
or  left  undone  anything,  within  his  power,  that  might 
have  contributed  to  their  welfare,  hut  for  the  reason  that, 
during  the  year  or  more  that  he  was  in  authority,  that 
is,  from  July,  1805,  to  August,  1806,  he  succeeded  in  so 
embroiling  himself  with  the  territorial  ojBBcials  with  whom 
it  was  his  duty  to  act,  as  to  interfere  very  seriously  with 
his  chances  of  usefulness.  In  less  than  four  months  after 
his  arrival  in  the  territory,  his  relations  with  Rufus 
Easton,  one  of  the  most  honorable  men  in  all  that  region, 
and  the  first  postmaster  St.  Louis  ever  had,  were  of  such 
a  character  tliat  he  refused  to  send  his  mail  through  that 
office  ;  and  before  the  end  of  the  year,  according  to  his 
own  statement.  Judge  Lucas,  Colonel  Hammond,  who  had 
been  commandant  of  the  district  of  St.  Louis  under  Gov- 
ernor Harrison,  of  Indiana,  and  other  leading  citizens  of 
the  territory  were  engaged  in  "  a  cabal "  to  bring  about 
his  removal. 

Of  the  causes  that  led  to  this  opposition  it  is  impos- 
sible to  speak  with  certainty.  The  little  that  we  know 
about  the  matter  has  to  be  picked  out,  item  by  item, 
from  his  own  letters  and  from  the  evidence  of  his  friends 
and  enemies,  submitted  in  a  case  in  which  his  conduct 
as  governor  was  not  a  point  at  issue,  and  hence  the  diffi- 
culty of  reducing  the  charges  agamst  him  to  anything 
like  a  definite  form,  and  the  many  grains  of  allowance 
with  which  they  are  to  be  taken.  Without  attempting, 
therefore,  anything  like  a  detailed  statement  of  the  causes 
of  complaint  against  him,  it  will  be  sufficient  to  say  that 
in  one  of  his  letters  we  find  a  reference  to  the  charge 
"  of  improper  interference  in  the  conduct  of  the  com- 
missioners ; "  and  that  Major  Bruff,  who  seems  to  haA^e 
been  a  personal  as  well  as  jiolitical  enemy,  asserts  that 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  89 

he  was  in  favor  of  keeping  the  territory  under  military 
rule,  and  complains  that  he  was  not  only  "  averse  to  the 
first  American  settlers  and  Democrats,"  of  both  of  which 
classes  he  is  said  to  have  entertained  an  unfavorable 
opinion,  but  that  he  was  '"  prepossessed  in  favor  ...  of 
the  rich  French  landholders  under  antedated  and  other 
large  grants,  royalists,  federalists,  and  Burrites,  alias  the 
new  honest  Republicans,  who  came  out  with  him  expect- 
ing appointments."  Reduced  to  plain  English,  this 
simply  means  either  that  he  had  been  engaged  in  land 
speculations  on  his  private  account,  or  had  interfered 
with  those  of  some  of  his  neighbors ;  and  that  in  the 
distribution  of  the  few  offices  that  were  within  his  gift, 
he  had  not  met  the  expectations  of  one  wing,  at  least,  of 
the  political  party  to  which  he  owed  his  aijpointment. 

In  regard  to  the  first  of  these  charges  there  is  not 
much  to  be  said.  Wilkinson  was  a  speculator,  and  no 
matter  how  high  the  position  he  happened  to  hold,  there 
was  never  a  time  when  he  was  not  ready  to  engage  in 
schemes  for  improving  his  pecuniary  condition.  This 
course  was  not  necessarily  criminal,  neither  was  it  always 
improper,  though  there  were  times  when  it  was  undigni- 
fied, and  when  it  led  him  into  the  performance  of  acts 
that  were  open  to  suspicion.  Such,  indeed,  seems  to 
have  been  the  case  in  the  present  instance  ;  for  although 
in  purchasing  a  large  tract  of  land  adjoining  the  spot  he 
had  selected  as  a  cantonment  for  the  troops,  he  laid  him- 
self open  to  the  accusation  of  using  his  official  position 
for  the  purpose  of  advancing  his  private  interest,  yet  he 
afterwards  sold  it  to  the  government  for  the  same  price 
he  had  paid  for  it,  and  this  fact  is  sufficient  to  induce 
those  who  are  charitably  disposed  to  acquit  him  of  the 
charge. 


90  MISSOURI. 

But  whilst  cheerfully  absolving  him  from  blame  in 
this  particular  transaction,  it  is  not  so  easy  to  relieve  him 
of  the  political  offenses  that  are  laid  at  his  door.  Upon 
this  count  of  the  indictment  he  is  clearly  guilty,  though 
it  may  perhaps  lighten  our  verdict  to  know  that,  in  pur- 
suing the  independent  course  which  he  seems  to  have 
marked  out  for  himself,  and  which  received  the  approval 
of  the  authorities  at  Washington,  he  claimed  to  have 
been  actuated  by  a  desire  to  unite  the  honest  and  mod- 
erate men  of  both  parties,  Federal  as  well  as  Republi- 
can, in  an  effort  "  to  save  the  Constitution  and  prevent 
a  division  of  property  which  the  Democrats,"  led  by 
that  arch  aristocrat  Randolph,  of  Roanoke,  are  said  to 
have  "  aimed  at."  Absurd  as  this  explanation  now  seems, 
it  was  the  reason,  according  to  Major  Bruff,  that  Wilkin- 
son assigned  for  the  course  which  he  had  thought  proper 
to  pursue  in  administering  the  affairs  of  the  territory  ; 
and  we  therefore  give  it,  not  that  his  conduct  stood 
in  need  of  any  justification  even  in  that  era  of  intense 
political  feeling,  but  for  the  reason  that  it  furnishes  us 
with  what  may  be  considered  either  as  a  statement  of 
the  dangers  that  were  then  thought  to  threaten  the  exist- 
ence of  the  infant  republic,  or  as  a  specimen  of  the  clap- 
trap in  which  our  fathers,  under  the  pressure  of  party 
necessity,  were  wont  to  indulge.  Be  this  as  it  may, 
thei'e  can  be  no  question  as  to  the  extent  of  the  oppo- 
sition which  Wilkinson  managed  to  excite,  and  of  the 
high  character  of  some  of  those  who  took  side  against 
him  ;  neither,  on  the  other  hand,  can  there  be  any  doubt 
as  to  the  honesty  and  integrity  of  those  who  defended 
him,  among  the  stanchest  of  whom  we  must  continue 
to  reckon  President  Jefferson. 

Aside  from  the  character  of  this  opposition,  which  is  of 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  91 

interest  as  showing  the  rapid  growth  of  what  are  some- 
times termed  American  poUtical  ideas,  hut  which  is  too 
often  but  another  name  for  the  vulgar  greed  for  money 
or  office,  the  only  event  of  importance  that  occurred  dur- 
ing Wilkinson's  term  was  the  short  visit  which,  in  Sep- 
tember, 1805,  Aaron  Burr  made  to  his  brother-in-law 
Dr.  Browne,  of  St.  Louis.  Of  the  secret  purposes  of  this 
visit,  or  rather  of  what  are  supposed  to  have  been  such, 
it  is  not  my  province  to  speak ;  neither  does  it  come 
within  the  limits  marked  out  for  my  guidance  to  investi- 
gate the  connection  which  may  or  may  not  have  existed 
between  Burr  and  Wilkinson.  All  that  we  ai*e  per- 
mitted to  know  on  the  subject  is  that  both  of  these 
gentlemen  were  afterwards  placed  upon  trial,  the  former 
in  1807  for  conspiring  to  break  up  the  federal  Union, 
and  the  latter,  several  years  later,  for  being  an  acces- 
sory to  this  and  other  crimes  ;  and  that  the  government 
not  only  failed  to  prove  that  Burr  was  engaged  in  any 
such  conspiracy,  but  that  Wilkinson,  who  was  the  chief 
witness  against  him,  was  able  to  show  that,  in  October, 
1804,  he  had  written  to  Robert  Smith,  Mr.  Jefferson's 
Secretary  of  the  Navy,  that  "  Burr  was  about  some- 
thing," whether  internal  or  extei'nal  he  could  not  say, 
but  that  "  an  eye  ought  to  be  kept  on  him."  This  let- 
ter, it  will  be  observed,  was  written  and  received  a  year 
and  more  before  the  final  collapse  of  Burr's  plans, 
whatever  they  may  have  been  ;  and  of  course  in  the 
face  of  such  evidence  and  of  Wilkinson's  subsequent 
conduct,  it  was  impossible  to  convict  him  of  any  com- 
plicitj'  with  them.  Accordinoly,  after  one  of  the  most 
searching  investigations  of  which  we  have  any  record, 
he  was,  in  December,  1811,  acquitted  by  the  court  of 
inquiry  which  had  been  summoned  to  investigate  the 
charges  made  against  him. 


92  MISSOURI. 

Of  the  substantial  justice  of  this  verdict  there  is,  to- 
day, but  little  doubt,  thouah  Burr,  in  after  years,  whilst 
ridiculing  the  idea  that  he  had  been  engaged  in  any 
conspiracy  against  the  federal  Union,  did  not  hesitate  to 
say  that  his  object  had  been  to  revolutionize  Mexico, 
and  that  Wilkinson  had  been  a  party  to  the  scheme, 
but  that  at  the  critical  moment  he  had  betrayed  and  de- 
feated it.  That  he  did  expose  and  defeat  the  move- 
ment is  most  true  ;  but  whether  he  was  ever  a  party  to  it 
is  a  point  about  which  opinions  may  well  differ.  Burr's 
unsupported  assertion  is  not  sufficient  to  establish  the 
fact ;  and  whilst  there  are  circumstances  in  Wilkinson's 
career  at  this  time  which,  taken  by  themselves,  are  cal- 
culated to  make  us  doubt  his  integrity,  yet  inasmuch  as 
they  can,  when  considered  with  reference  to  the  hostile 
attitude  which  the  United  States  and  Spain  then  held 
towards  each  other,  be  explained  without  in  any  way 
impeaching  his  honor,  it  is  but  fair  to  allow  him  the 
benefit  of  the  doubt,  and  of  the  acquittal  which  neces- 
sarily goes  with  it. 

In  September  of  the  year  following  this  visit,  a  few 
weeks  only  after  Wilkinson  had  left  for  the  scene  of 
the  boundary  dispute  between  Spain  and  the  United 
States  on  the  banks  of  the  Sabine,  Lewis  and  Clark 
returned  from  their  overland  journey  to  the  Pacific, 
bringing  with  them  as  one  of  the  results  of  the  expedi- 
tion a  better  knowledge  of  the  extent  and  course  of  the 
Missouri  and  the  Columbia  rivers,  and  of  the  valleys 
through  which  they  flow.  It  was  the  first  expedition  o£ 
the  kind  ever  undertaken  by  our  government,  and  the 
return  of  the  party,  safe  and  successful,  after  an  absence 
of  over  two  years,  was  hailed  with  delight  throughout 
the  entire  West.     Congress,  too,  sharing  in  the  general 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  93 

acclaim,  voted  a  grant  of  land  to  each  person  engaged 
in  the  expedition  ;  and  in  the  spring  of  1807,  in  further 
recognition  of  his  services,  Captain  Lewis  was  appointed 
governor  of  the  territory  which  he  had  done  so  much 
to  make  known. 

When,  after  a  delay  of  some  months,  he  arrived  in 
St.  Louis,  he  found  the  affairs  of  his  government  in  a 
very  disorderly  condition.  The  officials  are  said  to 
have  been  distracted  by  "  feuds  and  contentions,"  and 
the  people  themselves,  who  seem  to  have  caught  the  in- 
fection, "  were  divided  into  factions  and  parties."  Un- 
satisfactory as  is  this  picture,  for  which  we  are  indebted 
to  Mr.  Jefferson,  it  is  not  as  discouraging  as  is  the  one 
which  Major  Bruff  has  left  us  of  the  condition  of  affairs 
that  then  prevailed.  According  to  him  "  the  territoiy 
was  convulsed  ;  society  and  confidence  destroyed  ;  Amer- 
ican citizens  obliged  to  arm  with  dirks  and  pistols,  and 
the  old  inhabitants  lamenting  the  change  of  masters." 
To  a  certain  extent  this  account  is  true,  but  taken  as  a 
whole,  the  impression  it  conveys  is  decidedly  erroneous. 
Thus,  for  instance,  whilst  it  is  true  that  the  "  old  inhab- 
itants," meaning  thereby  the  Creoles,  were  opposed  to 
the  transfer  of  the  colony  to  the  United  States,  as  were 
a  large  number  of  the  English-American  residents  as 
well,  and  whilst  it  is  also  true  that  there  was  more  or 
less  uneasiness  throughout  the  territory,  growing  out  of 
the  delay  of  Congress  in  confirming  certain  classes  of 
land  grants,  yet  it  is  not  true  that  society  and  confidence 
were  destroyed ;  neither  were  the  Amei-ican  citizens 
obliged  to  arm  themselves,  though  the  custom  of  carry- 
ing weapons  Avas  at  that  time,  and  for  some  years  after- 
wards, so  general  that  "  the  judges  on  the  benches  had 
their  pistols  and  ataghans  by  their  sides."     Indeed,  so 


94  MISSOURI. 

far  is  the  pictiu-e  from  being  true  to  life  that  courts 
were  held  regularly  in  the  different  districts  into  whicli 
the  territoi-y  had  been  divided,  and,  what  is  more  to  the 
purpose,  they  appear  to  have  found  no  difficulty  in  en- 
forcing their  decrees,  even  in  cases  where  the  supreme 
penalty  of  the  law  was  adjudged.  Real  estate,  too,  had 
increased  enormously  in  value,  in  some  quarters  as  much 
as  five  hundred  per  cent.  ;  and  the  eager  demand  for  it 
that  prevailed  everywhere,  a  demand  which  seems  to 
have  been  shared  by  the  witness  himself,  was  scarcely 
comjDatible  with  the  state  of  lawlessness  that  is  said  to 
have  existed. 

Whilst,  therefore,  so  much  of  this  testimony  as  refers 
to  the  overthrow  of  social  order  may  be  rejected  safely,  it 
cannot  be  denied  that  there  were  causes  at  work  which, 
among  a  people  so  combative  naturally  as  the  American 
emigrants  were,  occasionally  brought  on  one  of  those 
bloody  personal  encounters  which  gave  the  territory  the 
reputation  of  being  an  uncomfortable  abiding  place  for 
persons  of  weak  nerves.  Among  these  causes  may  be 
mentioned  the  prominence  of  the  military  element  at 
certain  social  centres,  and  the  tone  which  it  gave  to 
society ;  the  personal  character  which  the  heated  polit- 
ical discussions  of  that  day  were  wont  to  assume  ;  and 
the  lawsuits  and  disputes  which  sprang  from  conflicting 
land  claims,  mining  rights,  and  other  similar  sources, 
and  which  were  not  unfrequently  submitted  to  the  arbi- 
trament of  the  pistol.  "  '  Mr.  P.,'  said  the  well-known 
Colonel  S.  to  a  neighbor  with  whom  he  had  a  dispute 
about  a  mining  claim,  '  we  have  been  friends  for  a  long 
time,  and  I  feel  great  regret  that  any  misunderstanding 
should  have  arisen  between  us ;  here  we  are  entirely 
alone,  and  there  is  no  one  to  interrupt  us  —  let  us  settle 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  95 

the  matter  in  an  amicable  way.  You  know  my  aver- 
sion to  law  and  lawyers,  and  their  quibbles  ;  I  have 
here  a  couple  of  friends  that  have  no  mistake  in  them. 
Take  your  choice,  they  are  both  loaded  and  equally 
true.'  Mr.  P.,  without  losing  his  presence  of  mind, 
thanked  him  and  declined  the  proffered  civility  on  ac- 
count of  important  business  which  could  not  be  trans- 
acted by  a  ghost,  whereupon  Colonel  S.  resumed  the 
conversation,  which  he  had  interrupted  for  the  purpose 
of  making  what  he  considered  a  friendly  offer." 

Fortunately,  the  circles  within  which  these  influences 
were  active  were  necessarily  small,  being  confined  al- 
most entirely  to  the  two  extremes  of  the  social  scale. 
At  the  one  end  were  to  be  found  "  the  persons  of  note," 
as  Brackenridge  calls  them,  or  ''the  small  class  that 
denominate  themselves  the  gentlemen,"  as  they  are 
styled  by  Flint,  among  whom  the  duel  was  still  recog- 
nized as  the  proper  mode  of  settling  personal  quarrels, 
as  it  still  was  in  some  of  the  more  favored  localities  of 
the  east.  At  the  other  were  the  miners,  consisting  of 
"  some  of  the  rudest  and  most  savage  of  the  uncivilized 
portion  of  civilized  society,"  who  were  exceedingly  jeal- 
ous of  their  "  natural  rights,"  as  taking  lead  from  pub- 
lic lands  seems  to  have  been  termed,  but  who,  even 
when  engaged  in  this  illegal  pursuit,  were  so  far  from 
being  lawless  that  they  had  found  it  necessary  to  frame 
a  set  of  regulations  which,  with  but  little  change,  may 
have  served  as  models  for  those  that,  long  afterwards, 
brought  order  into  the  mining  camps  of  California. 

Among  these  two  classes,  comprising  at  best  but  a 
small  part  of  the  total  population  of  the  territory, 
fatal  duels  and  bloody  "  rencontres "  were  relatively 
frequent,  though  they  were  not  so  common  as  they  are 


96  MISSOURI. 

sometimes  represented  to  have  been,  nor  were  they  so 
general.  Upon  this  point  Timotiiy  Flint,  a  New 
England  clergyman,  who  lived  in  upper  Louisiana  from 
1816  to  about  1820,  and  who  traveled  extensively  not 
only  in  that  territory,  but  also  in  what  are  now  the  States 
of  Arkansas  and  Louisiana,  is  certainly  good  authority. 
Protesting  against  the  injustice  of  ascribing  to  a  whole 
community  the  crimes  of  a  few  fierce  and  ungovernable 
natures  he  tells  us  that  "it  is  true  there  are  worthless 
people  here,  and  the  most  so,  it  must  be  confessed,  are 
from  New  England.  It  is  true  there  are  gamblers,  and 
gougers,  and  outlaws  ;  but  there  are  fewer  of  them  than, 
from  the  nature  of  things  and  the  character  of  the  age 
and  the  world,  we  ought  to  expect.  ...  I  have,"  he 
adds,  "  traveled  in  these  regions  thousands  of  miles  un- 
der all  circumstances  of  exposure  and  danger  .  .  .  and 
this,  too,  in  many  instances  where  I  was  not  known  as  a 
minister,  or  where  such  knowledge  would  have  had  no 
influence  in  protecting  me.  I  have  never  carried  the 
slightest  weapon  of  defense.  I  scarcely  remember  to 
have  experienced  anything  that  resembled  insult,  or  to 
have  felt  myself  in  danger  from  the  people.  I  have 
often  seen  men  that  had  lost  an  eye.  Instances  of  mur- 
der, numerous  and  horrible  in  their  circumstances,  have 
occurred  in  my  vicinity.  But  they  were  such  lawless 
rencontres  as  terminate  in  murder  everywhere,  and  in 
■which  the  drunkenness,  brutality,  and  violence  were  mu- 
tual. They  were  catastrophes,  in  which  quiet  and  sober 
men  would  be  in  no  danger  of  being  involved." 

Of  the  backwoodsman  of  the  West,  that  representative 
in  fact  as  well  as  in  name  of  the  great  majority  of  the 
emigrants,  the  same  writer  says  :  "  He  is  generally  an 
amiable  and  virtuous  man.  .  .  .  He  has  vices  and  bar- 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  97 

barisms  peculiar  to  his  situation.  His  manners  are 
rough.  He  wears,  it  may  be,  a  long  beard.  He  has  a 
great  quantity  of  bear  or  deer  skins  ^vrought  into  his 
household  establishment,  his  furniture  and  dress.  He 
carries  a  knife,  or  a  dirk  in  his  bosom,  and  when  in  the 
woods  has  a  rifle  on  liis  back  and  a  pack  of  dogs  at  his 
heels.  An  Atlantic  stranger,  transferred  directly  from 
one  of  our  cities  to  his  door,  would  recoil  from  a  ren- 
counter with  him.  But  remember,  that  his  rifle  and  his 
dogs  are  among  his  chief  means  of  support  and  profit. 
Remember,  that  all  his  first  days  here  were  passed  in 
dread  of  the  savages.  Remember,  that  he  still  encoun- 
ters them,  still  meets  bears  and  panthers.  Enter  his 
door  and  tell  him  you  are  benighted,  and  wish  the  shel- 
ter of  his  cabin  for  the  night.  The  welcome  is  indeed 
seemingly  ungi"acious  :  '  I  reckon  you  can  stay,'  or  '  I 
suppose  we  must  let  you  stay.'  But  this  apparent  ungra- 
ciousness is  the  harbinger  of  every  kindness  that  he  can 
bestow,  and  every  comfort  that  his  cabin  can  afford. 
Good  coffee,  corn  bread  and  butter,  venison,  pork,  wild 
and  tame  fowls,  are  set  before  you.  His  wife,  timid, 
silent,  reserved,  but  constantly  attentive  to  your  comfort, 
does  not  sit  at  the  table  with  you,  but  like  the  wives 
of  the  patriarchs  stands  and  attends  on  you.  You  are 
shown  the  best  bed  which  the  house  can  offer.  When 
the  kind  hospitality  has  been  afforded  you  as  long  as  you 
choose  to  stay,  and  when  you  depart,  and  speak  about 
your  bill,  you  are  most  commonly  told  with  some  slight 
mark  of  resentment  that  they  do  not  keep  tavern.  Even , 
the  flaxen-haired  children  will  turn  away  from  your 
money.  ...  If  we  were  to  try  them  by  the  standard  of 
New  England  customs  and  opinions,  that  is  to  say,  the 
customs    of    a   people    under   entirely  different  circum- 


98  MISSOURI. 

stances,  there  would  be  many  things  in  the  picture  that 
would  strike  us  offensively.  They  care  little  about  min- 
isters, and  think  less  about  paying  them.  They  are 
averse  to  all,  even  the  most  necessary,  restraints.  They 
are  destitute  of  the  forms  and  observances  of  society  and 
religion ;  but  they  are  sincere  and  kind  without  profes- 
sions, and  have  a  coarse  but  substantial  morality."  In 
a  word,  they  were  "  a  hardy,  adventurous,  hospitable, 
rough,  but  sincere  and  upright  race." 

These  were  the  peojjle  who  were  now  coming  into  the 
territory,  and  who  were  to  shape  its  destiny.  As  a  rule 
they  were  sturdy,  self-reliant  scions  of  British  stock,  emi- 
grants chiefly  from  the  States  that  were  afterwards  known 
as  Southern,  though  Pennsylvania  had  already  sent  a 
colony  of  hard-working  Germans,  and  among  those  who 
came  from  New  York  and  New  England  we  recognize 
such  honored  names  as  Easton  and  Hempstead.  Es- 
pecially liberal  were  Kentucky  and  Virginia  in  the  con- 
tributions which  they  made  to  the  life  of  the  new  terri- 
tory, just  as  in  after-years  Missouri  sent  her  sons  and 
daughters  to  people  the  regions  still  further  to  the  west 
and  south. 

Unlike  the  early  French  settlers,  who  preferred  to  live 
in  villages  and  were  content  with  an  allotment  in  the 
common  fields,  these  new-comers  were  farmers  after  the 
English- American  fashion,  and  their  objects  in  coming 
to  the  territory  were  to  acquire  land  in  as  large  tracts 
as  possible,  and  to  avail  themselves  of  the  vast  extent  of 
free  pasturage  or  "  range  "  which  the  unoccupied  govern- 
ment land  afforded.  To  secure  these  advantages,  they 
passed  by  the  villages  and  settled  neighborhoods  near 
the  river,  and  penetrating  into  the  wilderness  they  estab- 
lished themselves  on   detached  farms,  usually  at  some 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  99 

distance  from  each  other  ;  for  the  average  emigrant  from 
the  States  "  never  wished  to  live  near  enough  to  hear 
the  bark  of  his  neighbor's  dog,"  unless  the  prospect  of 
danger  from  the  Indians  obliged  him  to  build  his  cabin 
within  easy  reach  of  some  central  fort  or  station,  to 
whicli,  in  case  of  necessity,  he  might  repair. 

With  the  incoming  tide  of  emigration  and  its  steady 
flow  westward,  the  frontier,  which  at  the  time  of  the 
purchase  in  1803  may  be  said  to  have  been  limited  to 
the  villages  and  settlements  along  the  west  bank  of  the 
river,  was  gradually  pushed  forward,  until  at  the  close  of 
the  first  decade  of  the  century  the  inhabited  portion  of 
the  territory  comprised  an  area  some  fifteen  or  twenty 
miles  in  width,  extending  from  the  Arkansas  to  a  point  a 
short  distance  above  the  mouth  of  the  Missouri,  and  em- 
bracing the  districts  of  New  Madrid,  Cape  Girardeau, 
Ste.  Genevieve,  St.  Louis,  and  St.  Charles.  At  this  rate 
of  progress,  it  was  a  question  of  only  a  few  years  before 
the  advance  guard  of  pioneers  would  be  upon  Indian 
territory,  if  it  was  not  already  there ;  and  as  such  con- 
tact had  always  led  to  hostilities,  it  became  an  object 
with  the  authorities  at  Washington,  as  it  was  their  pol- 
icy, to  lessen  the  chances  of  collision  by  buying  the  land 
next  adjoining  the  settlements  of  the  whites,  and  remov- 
ing the  Indians  further  westward.  In  pursuance  of  this 
plan,  Pierre  Chouteau,  acting  under  the  instructions  of 
Governor  Lewis,  concluded  a  treaty  with  the  Osages  in 
1808,  by  which  it  was  agreed  that  the  boundary  between 
them  and  the  whites  should  begin  at  Fort  Clark,  a  post 
on  the  Missouri  thirty-five  miles  below  the  mouth  of  the 
Kansas,  and  "  extend  due  south  to  the  Arkansas,  and 
down  the  same  to  the  Mississippi."  AU  east  of  this  line, 
comprising,  as  it  was  then  estimated,  about  forty-eight 


100  MISSOURI. 

millions  of  acres,  was  ceded  to  the  United  States.  By 
the  same  treaty,  though  this  seems  to  have  heen  rather 
a  formality,  all  the  lands  north  of  the  Missouri  to  which 
the  Osages  had  any  claims  were  also  relinquished.  Of 
the  territory  so  ceded,  something  over  one  half  is  said 
to  have  been  within  the  limits  of  Missouri,  and  this 
amount,  somewhat  exaggerated,  it  is  true,  added  to  the 
three  millions  of  acres  purchased  in  the  autumn  of 
1804  from  the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  gives  an  estimated  total 
of  about  twenty-seven  millions  of  acres,  —  almost  two 
thirds  of  the  present  area  of  the  State,  —  to  which  the 
Indian  title  was  extinguished. 

With  the  terms  of  this  treaty,  or  the  circumstances 
under  which  it  was  concluded,  we  are  not  now  concerned, 
except  in  so  far  as  the  knowledge  of  the  manner  in  which 
these  jinrchases  were  sometimes  made  may  cause  us  to 
look  with  less  austerity  upon  the  free-and-easy  way  in 
which  the  Fi'ench  and  Spaniards  were  accustomed  to 
deal  with  questions  of  this  sort.  According  to  their 
theory,  the  land  belonged  to  them,  and  not  to  the  Indi- 
ans, and  hence  they  were  never  troubled  by  any  consci- 
entious scruples  as  to  the  title  by  which  they  held  it. 
When  they  wanted  a  tract,  be  it  large  or  small,  they  did 
not  think  it  necessary  to  go  through  the  farce  of  a  treaty 
in  order  to  get  it,  but  they  simply  took  what  they  wanted 
and  indemnified  the  Indians,  or,  if  the  exact  terms  be 
preferred,  "kept  them  quiet"  by  a  system  of  i)resents,  a 
mode  of  procedure  which  the  savages  could  understand, 
and  which  was  "  more  acceptable  to  them  than  the  same 
articles  would  have  been  if  given  in  payment  of  a  debt." 
Such  a  course,  no  doubt,  savored  of  the  strong  hand,  but 
it  was  open  and  above  board ;  and  if,  as  was  usually  the 
case,  the  Indians  were  the  sufferers  in  the  transaction. 


LOU  J  a  IAN  A   TERRITURY.  101 

SO  also  were  they  in  their  dealings  with  the  United  States. 
Indeed,  on  the  score  of  justice  and  morality,  it  may  be 
questioned  whether  the  high-handed  measures  of  the 
French  and  Spaniards  were  not  less  objectionable  than 
were  the  devious  methods  to  which  our  government 
sometimes  resorted  when  seeking  to  consummate  a  so- 
called  purchase.  Thus,  for  examjjle,  when  Brackenridge, 
sjDeaking  of  such  transactions  in  general,  but  with  evi- 
dent reference  to  this  particular  case,  tells  us  that  "  our 
agents  may  have  gone  too  far  in  procuring  the  consent 
of  the  chiefs,"  or  that  "  the  chiefs  may  have  been  created 
for  the  express  purpose  "  of  giving  their  consent,  it  is  but 
another  and  a  gentler  way  of  saying  that  the  sale  may 
have  been  brought  about  by  bribery,  or  in  some  other  in- 
defensible way,  HajDpily,  the  evidence  is  not  sufficient 
to  justify  us  in  asserting  that  either  of  the  methods  re- 
ferred to  was  adopted  in  this  instance  ;  but  there  were 
others,  not  less  efficacious,  which  wei'e  equally  available, 
and  the  fact  that  the  great  body  of  the  Osages  were  dis- 
satisfied with  the  terms  of  the  treaty  is  proof  that  there 
were  some  features  about  it  that  did  not  commend  them- 
selves to  the  Indians'  sense  of  fairness.  This,  however, 
was  a  matter  of  but  little  moment  to  the  other  contract- 
ing party.  For  reasons  that  were  perfectly  satisfactory, 
it  was  deemed  necessary  to  insist  upon  the  purchase, 
though  the  authorities  at  Washington  suffered  two  years 
to  elapse  before  they  took  any  steps  towards  complying 
with  their  part  of  the  bargain.  At  the  end  of  this  period, 
the  Osages  were  informed  that  the  first  payment  for  their 
land  was  ready,  and,  accordingly,  some  thirty  or  forty 
of  their  chiefs  and  head  men  repaired  to  St.  Louis,  ap- 
parently not  so  much  for  the  purpose  of  receiving  the 
amount  due  them  as  to  protest  against  the  enforcement 


102  MISSOURI. 

of  the  treaty,  which,  they  contended,  had  been  unfairly 
made.  In  a  council  held  for  the  purpose,  Le  Sonneur, 
who  was  the  orator  for  the  occasion,  and  who  is  said  to 
have  "  spoken  with  great  art  and  sonae  eloquence,"  ad- 
dressed the  governor  as  follows :  "  He  was  much  sur- 
prised to  hear  of  this  purchase,  which  had  been  forgotten 
by  his  nation,  and  he  supposed  had  also  been  forgotten 
by  his  great  father.  The  sale  was  made  by  those  who 
had  no  authority ;  and  his  great  father  not  having  com- 
plied with  his  part  of  the  bargain,  by  delaying  two  years 
the  stipulated  payment,  and  not  performing  the  other 
parts  of  the  treaty,  his  nation  ought  not  to  be  held  to 
their  pai-t  of  it,  even  if  fairly  entered  into.  But,"  said 
he,  "the  Osage  nation  has  no  right  to  sell  its  country, 
much  less  have  a  few  chiefs,  who  have  taken  it  upon 
themselves  to  do  so  ;  our  country  belongs  to  our  posterity 
as  well  as  to  ourselves  ;  it  is  not  absolutely  ours ;  we  re- 
ceive it  only  for  our  lifetime,  and  then  to  transmit  it  to 
our  descendants.  .  .  .  No,  my  father,  keep  your  goods, 
and  let  us  keep  our  lands."  To  this  statement,  admit- 
ting its  truth,  there  can  be  no  answer,  whether  we  regard 
it  from  an  Indian's  point  of  view,  or  whether  we  look 
upon  it,  as  in  fact  we  are  bound  to  do,  as  the  protest  of 
a  weak  but  independent  people  against  the  unjust  pre- 
tensions of  a  powerful  neighbor.  Such,  at  all  events, 
seems  to  have  been  the  opinion  of  Governor  Howard,  who 
was  appointed  to  office  on  the  death  of  Captain  Lewis  in 
1809,  and  in  whose  hands  the  negotiation  now  rested. 
Instead  of  attempting  to  defend  the  course  of  the  whites 
either  in  making  the  treaty  or  in  carrying  out  its  pro- 
visions, he  contented  himself  with  telling  the  chiefs  that 
their  great  father  did  not  compel  the  Indians  to  sell  their 
lands,  but  that  when  they  did  they  must  adhere  to  the 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  103 

bargain  ;  "  that  the  annuities  for  two  years  were  ready 
for  them  :  if  they  chose  they  might  accept,  if  not  it  was 
of  no  consequence ;  the  land  woukl  still  be  considered 
as  purchased,  and  their  obstinacy  would  have  no  other 
effect  than  that  of  displeasing  their  great  father." 

With  this  decision  the  Indians  were  obliged  to  be  con- 
tent, and  it  speaks  well  for  the  influence  of  the  chiefs 
who  took  part  in  this  council  and  for  their  pacific  dis- 
position that,  notwithstanding  the  injustice  with  which 
they  felt  they  had  been  treated,  they  were  able  and  wil- 
ling to  hold  the  fighting  men  of  the  nation  to  the  terms 
of  the  treaty,  except,  perhaps,  so  far  as  it  related  to  horse- 
stealing. Upon  this  point  the  Osages  were  incorrigible  ; 
and  whilst  it  was  their  boast  that  they  had  never  shed 
the  blood  of  a  white  man,  the  reclamations  made  upon 
them  for  stolen  property  were  so  numerous  that  they 
exceeded  the  amount  of  their  annuities,  and  at  a  treaty 
made  in  September,  1818,  the  United  States  agreed  to 
assume  some  four  thousand  dollars  of  their  indebtedness 
in  return  for  another  liberal  slice  of  territory,  which  the 
Indians  duly  relinquished. 

But  whilst  the  Osages  may  be  said  to  have  submitted 
quietly  to  this  wholesale  appropriation  of  their  land, 
there  were  portions  of  the  tribes  who  claimed  the  re- 
gion north  of  the  Missouri  who  were  by  no  means  dis- 
posed to  bear  with  what  they  considered  as  a  similar 
injustice.  To  understand  the  condition  of  affairs  that 
prevailed  along  this  portion  of  the  frontier,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  bear  in  mind  that,  in  1803,  when  Louisiana  was 
purchased,  all  of  this  part  of  what  is  now  known  as  the 
State  of  Missouri,  as  well  as  the  northwest  quarter  of 
Illinois  and  a  part  of  southern  Wisconsin,  were  claimed 
by  the  Sacs  and  Foxes  and  their  allies  the  lowas.     Hav- 


104  MISSOURI. 

ing  driven  out  the  Missouris  and  practically  destroyed 
the  tribes  that  formed  the  Illinois  confederacy,  they 
held  the  most  of  this  region  by  right  of  conquest ;  and 
so  far  as  our  acknowledgment  of  this  fact  could  give 
them  a  valid  title,  they  were  its  undoubted  owners,  and 
they  so  continued  until  November,  1804,  when  they 
ceded  to  the  whites  all  of  their  possessions  east  of  the 
Mississippi,  including  the  Rock  River  valley  of  Illinois 
and  other  favorite  locahties.  In  the  same  treaty  they 
agreed  that,  west  of  the  Mississippi,  the  boundary  be- 
tween them  and  the  whites  should  be  a  line  drawn 
in  a  direct  course  from  the  Missouri  River,  opposite 
the  mouth  of  the  Gasconade,  to  a  point  on  the  Jef- 
freon  River  (Salt  ? )  thirty  miles  above  its  mouth,  and 
down  the  said  Jeffreon  to  its  junction  with  the  Mis- 
sissippi. West  and  north  of  this  line,  they  reserved  all 
the  rest  of  this  portion  of  Missouri ;  and  there  can  be 
no  doubt  that,  as  against  us,  they  held  it  by  an  indis- 
putable title  until  they  sold  it  in  August,  1824,  —  three 
years  after  Missouri  was  admitted  into  the  federal  Un- 
ion, though  long  before  that  time  the  whites  had  crossed 
the  boundary,  and  were  establishing  themselves  upon 
forbidden  ground. 

To  this  treaty,  especially  to  that  portion  of  it  which 
related  to  the  cession  of  their  lands  in  Illinois  and  Wis- 
consin, the  Sacs  and  Foxes  who  lived  east  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi were  bitterly  opposed.  They  complained  that 
the  sale  had  been  concluded  by  chiefs  who  were  sent  to 
St.  Louis  on  other  business,  but  who,  while  there,  had 
been  made  drunk,  and  when  in  that  condition  had  been 
induced  to  agree  to  it.  For  this  reason  they  held,  and 
justly,  too,  from  their  point  of  view,  that  it  was  not  bind- 
ing ;  and  there  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  the  part 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  105 

which  they  took  against  us  then,  and  in  the  war  of  1812 
with  England,  was  due  not  so  much  to  the  intrigues  of 
British  emissaries  and  traders,  as  it  was  to  the  deter- 
mination of  the  Indians  not  to  give  up  tlieir  homes  with- 
out a  struggle.  Their  opposition,  however,  was  of  no 
avail.  They  were  divided  among  themselves  as  to  their 
true  policy  ;  and  though  for  several  years,  from  the  be- 
ginning of  the  war  of  1812  until  its  conclusion  in  1815, 
those  of  the  Indians  who  took  up  the  hatchet  were  able 
to  keep  the  northern  frontiers  of  Missouri  and  Illinois 
in  a  state  of  constant  alarm,  yet  in  the  end  they  were 
obliged  to  succumb.  The  whites  had  become  too  nu- 
merous, and  were  too  well  organized,  to  be  successfully 
resisted.  Their  leaders  were  men  like  Governor  How- 
ard and  his  successor  Clark,  of  Missouri,  and  Governor 
Edwards,  of  Illinois,  who  were  familiar  with  every  })base 
of  border  life,  and  who  were  as  prompt  in  action  as  they 
were  skilled  in  the  arts  of  Indian  warfare  and  diplo- 
macy. Under  their  direction,  important  points  on  the 
Illinois  and  Mississippi  were  garrisoned,  forts,  or  ''  sta- 
tions "  as  they  were  called,  were  established  at  suitable 
intervals  along  the  frontier,  and  troojis  were  raised  for 
service  in  the  field,  and  for  patrol  duty  on  the  rivers  and 
in  the  more  exposed  districts.  The  Indians  of  the  Mis- 
souri, too,  especially  the  Sioux,  were  instigated  to  take 
up  arms  against  the  hostile  tribes  on  the  upper  Missis- 
sippi ;  and  if  we  may  credit  the  statement  of  Maimel 
Lisa,  the  agent  employed  in  the  matter,  they  did  good 
service. 

By  the  adoption  of  these  vigorous  measures,  the  hos- 
tile Indians  were  held  in  check  ;  and  the  fighting,  so 
far  as  there  was  any,  may  be  said  to  have  been  confined 
to   the    efforts  of  the    Americans  to  capture  and  hold 


106  MISSOURI. 

Prairie  clu  Chien,  With  the  exception  of  the  expedi- 
tions undertaken  for  this  purpose,  and  the  defensive 
and  retaliatory  measures  which  were  improvised  in  the 
different  neighborhoods,  the  people  of  upper  Louisiana 
were  not  called  upon  to  take  any  active  part  In  the  war, 
or  to  bear,  except  in  a  general  way,  any  of  its  burdens. 
Owing  to  the  early  successes  of  the  Americans,  the  Eng- 
lish troojis  that  might  have  been  spared  for  service  on 
the  Mississijjpi  were  needed  for  the  defense  of  the  Ca- 
nadian frontier  ;  and  the  defeat  of  the  Indians  at  Tip- 
pecanoe in  1811  had  so  shattered  the  strength  of  the 
confederated  tribes  that  when,  in  1812,  on  the  outbreak 
of  the  war  with  England,  Tecumseh  called  on  them  to 
take  up  arms  against  the  United  States,  it  was  found 
that  they  were  hopelessly  divided  among  themselves, 
and  that  but  a  moiety  of  their  warriors  wei-e  ready  to 
follow  him  into  the  British  camp.  Large  and  influential 
bands  of  the  most  hostile  of  the  tribes,  as  for  instance, 
the  Shawnees  and  the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  refused  to  take 
any  part  in  the  war,  preferring,  as  did  those  of  their 
friends  and  congeners  that  lived  west  of  the  Missis- 
sippi, to  trust  to  the  friendship  of  the  Americans,  fatal 
as  it  sometimes  proved,  rather  than  to  risk  the  chances 
of  a  collision.  In  such  a  contest,  with  the  advantages 
all  on  one  side,  the  result  could  not  long  be  doubtful. 
A  few  desultory  inroads  were  made  into  the  territory  by 
small  parties,  usually  from  the  east  side  of  the  river, 
and  occasionally  an  isolated  cabin  was  destroyed  and 
its  inmates  slaughtered  ;  but  beyond  this  the  Indians 
effected  nothing.  The  time  had  gone  by  when  they 
could  reenact,  here,  the  scenes  which  had  marked  the 
early  struggle  for  Kentucky  and  the  region  between  the 
Ohio  and  the  Lakes.    In  the  changed  condition  of  affairs. 


LOUISIANA    TERRITORY.  107 

the  Invasions  in  force,  the  determined  attacks  upon  forti- 
fied positions,  and  the  bloody  battles  that  characterized 
that  era  were  no  longer  possible. 

Under  tliese  circumstances,  the  struggle  on  the  part  of 
the  Indians  was  soon  seen  to  be  hopeless  even  by  them- 
selves. Accordingly,  when  the  Treaty  of  Ghent  made 
it  incumbent  on  the  United  States  to  put  an  end  to  the 
hostilities  against  the  tribes  with  whom  they  were  then 
at  war,  they  found  the  Indians  ready  to  meet  them  half 
way.  In  response  to  the  invitations  that  were  sent  out, 
representative  chiefs  from  nearly  all  the  hostiles  tribes 
repaired,  in  the  summer  of  1815,  to  Portage  des  Sioux, 
a  small  village  on  the  west  side  of  the  Mississippi  a  few 
miles  above  the  mouth  of  the  Missouri,  where  they  were 
met  by  the  American  commissioners  ;  and  as  both  j)ar- 
ties  were  anxious  for  peace  there  was  no  difficulty  in. 
agreeing  upon  the  terms.  Among  the  tribes  represented 
in  this  council  were  the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  or  i-ather 
those  of  them  who  had  adhered  to  the  United  States 
during  the  late  war,  and  who  on  that  account  had  been 
obliged  to  separate  themselves  from  the  rest  of  their 
nation  and  remove  to  the  Missouri.  The  Rock  River 
band,  though,  as  it  was  called,  still  held  out,  and  it 
was  not  until  the  next  year  that  they  finally  gave  in, 
and  agreed  to  a  settlement  upon  the  basis  of  the  treaty 
of  1804. 

With  the  conclusion  of  these  treaties,  Indian  wars  in 
the  territory  of  Louisiana,  and  we  may  also  add  in  the 
State  of  Missouri,  came  to  an  end ;  for  although  the 
mad  attempt,  in  1832,  of  Blackhawk  and  his  band  to 
repossess  themselves  of  the  Rock  River  valley  caused 
great  alarm  in  the  northeastern  portion  of  the  State,  and 
volunteers  were  sent  out  to  protect  the  settlers  in  that 


108  MISSOURI. 

quarter,  yet  the  struggle,  If  that  term  can  be  apphecl  to 
what  seems  to  have  been  the  last  frantic  effort  of  a  small 
party  of  desperate  men,  was  confined  to  the  region  east 
of  the  Mississippi,  and  was  soon  settled  by  the  capture 
of  Blackhawk  and  most  of  his  warriors.  Considered  as 
a  part  of  the  history  of  Missouri,  and  with  reference  to 
the  share  taken  by  the  State  in  suppressing  it,  this  out- 
break is  too  insignificant  to  merit  more  than  a  passing 
notice.  It  has,  however,  a  certain  dramatic  interest 
from  the  fact  that  President  Lincoln  and  his  whilom 
opponent  Jefferson  Davis  —  the  former  as  a  captain  of 
Illinois  volunteers,  and  the  latter  as  lieutenant  in  the 
regular  army  —  were  both  engaged  in  the  pursuit  and 
capture  of  this  marauding  band  of  savages. 

Returning  from  this  digression,  which  has  led  us  to 
anticipate  by  some  years  the  current  of  events,  and  re- 
suming the  thread  of  our  narrative,  it  will  be  found 
that  the  concluding  year  of  Governor  Howard's  admin- 
istration, memorable  as  it  was  in  the  history  of  the 
United  States  for  the  declaration  of  war  with  England, 
was  notable  in  the  local  annals  of  the  territory  for  cer- 
tain events  which  have  been  more  or  less  far-reaching 
in  their  consequences.  Prominent  among  these  was  the 
earthquake  of  1811,  by  which  the  village  of  New  Mad- 
rid and  the  settlements  at  Big  and  Little  Prairie  were, 
for  the  time  being,  practically  broken  up,  and  the  sur- 
face of  all  that  portion  of  the  State  was  essentially 
changed.  The  first  and  one  of  the  severest  of  these 
shocks,  or  series  of  shocks,  was  felt  on  the  night  of 
December  16,  1811  ;  another  of  equal  violence  was  ex- 
perienced some  months  later ;  and  after  that  they  were 
repeated  at  intervals,  but  with  lessening  intensity,  until 
finally,  after  the  lapse  of  some  years,  they  ceased  alto- 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  109 

gether.  Eye-witnesses  have  told  us  that  these  concus- 
sions were  divisible  into  two  classes,  in  one  of  which  the 
motion  was  })evpendiculav,  whilst  in  the  other  it  was 
horizontal.  Of  these,  the  latter  were  the  more  destruc- 
tive ;  "  when  they  were  felt,  the  houses  crumbled,  the 
trees  waved  together,  and  the  ground  sunk."  The  undu- 
lations at  such  times  are  described  as  resembling  waves, 
which  "  increased  in  elevation  as  they  advanced,  and 
when  they  had  attained  a  certain  fearful  height,  the 
earth  would  burst,  and  vast  volumes  of  water  and  sand 
and  pit-coal  were  discharged,  as  high  as  the  tops  of  the 
trees,  leaving  large  crevices  or  chasms  where  the  ground 
had  burst."  Lakes  of  twenty  miles  in  extent  and  more 
were  made  in  an  hour,  whilst  others  were  drained, 
and  whole  districts  were  covered  with  white  sand,  so 
that  they  became  uninhabitable.  "  Large  tracts,  includ- 
ing the  graveyard  at  New  Madrid  with  all  its  sleeping 
tenants,  were  thrown  into  the  river  ;  "  and  "  the  whole 
country  extending  to  the  mouth  of  the  Ohio  in  one  di- 
rection, and  to  the  St.  Francis  in  the  other,  including 
a  front  of  three  hundred  miles,  was  convulsed  to  such  a 
degree  as  to  create  lakes  and  islands,  the  number  of 
which  is  not  yet  known."- 

Fortunately,  the  country  was  thinly  settled,  and  as  the 
cabins  were  low  and  built  of  logs  it  was  not  easy  to  over- 
throw them  ;  so  that  although  many  of  them  were  shaken 
down,  the  loss  of  life  resulting  from  this  cause  was 
small.  In  fact,  if  we  except  those  who  are  said  to  have 
been  drowned  by  the  sinking  of  the  boats  in  the  river, 
of  which  there  is  no  record,  there  were  but  two  persons 
whose  deaths  can  be  attributed  to  the  earthquake,  and 
one  of  them  "  died  from  fright."  The  settlers,  as  soon 
as  they  saw  that  "  the  chasms  in  the  earth  were  in  direc- 


110  MISSOURI. 

tlon  from  southwest  to  northeast,  and  that  they  were  of 
an  extent  to  swallow  up  not  only  men,  but  houses,"  im- 
mediately felled  the  tallest  trees  at  right  angles  to  these 
chasms,  and  upon  these  trees  they  took  refuge  when 
warned  of  an  ajjproaching  shock.  By  this  simple  device 
"  all  were  saved."  As  the  people  did  not  dare  to  dwell 
in  houses,  they  passed  this  and  the  ensuing  winter  in 
booths  and  camps,  such  as  were  in  use  among  the  neigh- 
boring Indians.  Meanwhile  their  crops  were  neglected 
and  nearly  all  their  cattle  died.  This  was  a  serious  loss, 
and  would  inevitably  have  resulted  in  a  general  scarcity, 
but,  that  so  many  heavily  laden  flatboats  were  wrecked, 
"  and  their  contents  driven  by  the  eddy  into  the  bayou 
near  the  village  of  New  Madrid,"  that  provisions  of  all 
sorts  were  in  great  abundance.  Flour,  beef,  pork, 
bacon,  butter,  cheese,  apples,  in  a  word  all  the  articles 
that  usually  found  their  way  at  this  season  of  the  year 
to  the  New  Orleans  market,  were  in  such  quantities 
•'  as  scarcely  to  be  matters  of  sale." 

After  the  violence  of  the  earthquake  had  somewhat 
subsided,  the  country  is  said  to  have  exhibited  "  a  mel- 
ancholy aspect  of  chasms,  of  sand  covering  the  earth, 
of  trees  thrown  down  or  lying  at  an  angle  of  forty-five 
degrees,  or  split  in  the  middle."  The  settlement  at 
Little  Prairie  was  broken  up,  but  two  families  remaining 
out  of  a  hundred,  whilst  that  at  Big  Prairie,  one  of  the 
most  flourishing  on  the  west  bank  of  the  Mississij^pi,  was 
greatly  reduced,  and  New  Madrid  itself  had  sunk  into 
insignificance,  the  people  trembling  in  their  miserable 
hovels  at  the  distant  rumbling  of  an  approaching  shock. 
Even  as  late  as  1819,  this  district,  "  once  so  level,  rich, 
and  beautiful,  stUl  presented  the  appearance  of  decay. 
Large  and  beautiful  orchards,  left   uninclosed,  houses 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  Ill 

uninhabited,  deep  chasms  in  the  earth,  obvious  at  fre- 
quent intervals,  —  such  was  the  face  of  the  country,  al- 
though the  people  had  for  years  become  so  accustomed 
to  frequent  and  small  shocks,  which  did  no  essential  in- 
jury, that  the  lands  were  gradually  rising  again  in  value, 
and  New  Madrid  was  slowly  rebuilding  with  frail  build- 
ings, adapted  to  the  apprehensions  of  the  people."  ^ 

In  the  mean  time  Congress  had  been  appealed  to, 
and  had  responded  with  an  act  allowing  those  whose 
lands  had  been  damaged  or  destroyed  by  the  earth- 
quake to  locate  the  same  quantity  of  land  in  any  other 
portion  of  the  territory  that  was  open  to  entry.  It  was 
a  generous  provision,  but  it  proved  to  be  of  but  little 
benefit  to  the  actual  sufferers,  for  the  reason  that  al- 
most all  of  them  sold  out  their  claims  at  a  price  which 
is  said  to  have  averaged  less  than  ten  cents  per  acre. 
"  Out  of  five  hundred  and  sixteen  certificates  issued, 
only  twenty  were  located  by  the  original  claimants  or 
sufferers.  Three  hundred  and  eighty-four  were  held  by 
persons  who  resided  in  St.  Louis,  one  of  whom  had 
thirty-three,  another  forty,  another  twenty-six,  another 
sixteen,  and  others  from  one  to  five  each." 

Unfortunate  as  was  the  failure  of  this  act  to  effect 
the  end  desired,  it  was  not  the  worst  of  the  evUs  to  which 
it  is  said  to  have  given  rise.  Perjury  and  forgery  fol- 
lowed in  its  train,  and  were  so  common  that  there  came 
a  time  when  a  New  Madrid  claim  was  considered  as  a 
synonym   for   fraud.^     According  to  Mr.  H.  W.  Wil- 

1  Flint's  Recollections^  Letter  XX.     Boston,  1826. 

2  As  a  sample  of  the  frauds  perpetrated  under  this  act  we  have 
the  following,  taken  from  American  State  Papers,  title  Public 
Lands,  vol.  iv.  p.  009 :  — 

"A  claim  was  made  by  one  George  Tenelle  (who  had  eighteen 
other  New    Madrid   claims)  for  two   hundred   and   forty  acres, 


112  MISSOURI. 

liams,  whose  familiarity  with  the  land  laws  of  Missouri 
entitles  him  to  sjieak  with  authority,  no  less  than  one 
hundred  and  forty-two  claims,  set  up  by  persons  who 
falsely  represented  themselves  to  be  the  legal  represent- 
atives of  New  Madrid  sufferers,  were  confirmed  ;  and 
the  holders  were  permitted  to  surrender  lands  which 
they  never  owned,  receiving,  in  lieu  thereof,  certificates 
for  location  elsewhere.  These  certificates,  as  well  as 
those  that  were  genuine,  Avere  located  throughout  the 
State,  wherever  a  desirable  piece  of  land  could  be  found, 
often  without  regard  to  prior  claims,  and  this  of  course 
caused  a  vast  amount  of  litigation,  some  of  which  has 
continued  to  our  day. 

Of  a  totally  different  character,  but  not  less  influen- 
tial in  its  consequences,  was  the  act  of  Congress  of  June 
13,  1812,  which  confirmed  the  titles  of  the  inhabitants 
of  the  different  villages  of  the  territory  to  the  lots 
which  they  had  occupied  prior  to  the  20th  of  December, 
1803  ;  and  which  provided  "  that  all  town  or  village 
lots,  out-lots,  common-field  lots,  and  commons  in  and 
adjoining  and  belonging  to  the  towns  or  villages  of  the 
territory,  which  are  not  rightfully  owned  or  claimed  by 

which  he  claimed  as  assignee  of  Elisha  Jackson,  producing  docu- 
ments to  that  effect,  and  also  proof,  under  oath,  that  the  land 
had  been  materially  injured  by  earthquakes.  He  obtained  his 
certificate,  and  relinqixished  the  injured  land  to  the  United  States. 
It  was  then  entered  on  the  books  of  the  land  office  as  jjublic 
land  subject  to  entry.  In  182.5  it  was  entered  by  one  Evans  or 
Ogden,  who  proceeded  to  take  possession.  It  then  transi^ired 
that  Jackson  had  sold  the  land  in  1796,  that  the  purchaser  had 
constantly  lived  on  it  until  he  died  in  1819,  that  one  of  his  heirs 
had  lived  on  it  until  it  was  claimed  under  the  entry  at  the  land 
office,  and,  further,  that  it  was  a  valuable  farm,  which  had  never 
been  injured  by  the  earthquakes. ' '  —  Scharf '  s  History  of  St.  Louis, 
p.  328.     PhUadelphia,  188.3. 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  113 

any  private  individual,  or  held  as  commons  belonging 
to  such  towns  or  villages,  or  that  the  President  of  the 
United  States  may  not  think  proper  to  reserve  for  mili- 
tary purposes,  shall  and  the  same  are  hereby  reserved 
for  the  support  of  schools  in  the  respective  towns  or 
villages  aforesaid  ;  Provided,  that  the  whole  quantity 
of  land  contained  in  the  lots  reserved  for  the  support  of 
schools  in  any  town  or  village  shall  not  exceed  one 
twentieth  part  of  the  whole  lands  included  in  the  gen- 
eral survey  of  such  town  or  village." 

With  the  fii'st  of  these  provisions  we  do  not  propose 
to  concern  ourselves  further  than  to  say  that  it  was  one 
of  the  amendments  made  to  the  law  of  1804,  to  which 
we  have  already  referred,  and  that  whilst  it  brought  re- 
lief to  a  number  of  deserving  persons,  whose  cases  had 
hitherto  been  ruled  out  under  the  stringent  regulations 
of  Congress,  it  also  opened  wide  the  door  to  fraud  and 
perjury,  by  making  a  number  of  these  claims  depend 
for  their  validity  upon  the  recollection  by  witnesses  of 
events  which,  in  some  cases,  had  happened  years  before. 
Under  these  circumstances,  and  in  view  of  the  mania 
for  speculating  in  land  which  at  this  time  prevailed  in 
the  territory,  the  inducement  to  recollect  circumstances 
that  were,  to  say  the  least,  of  doubtful  occurrence,  was 
often  very  great,  and  it  need  not  surprise  us,  therefore, 
to  be  told  that  weak  human  nature  not  infrequently 
yielded  to  the  temptation.  Out  of  some  twenty-five 
hundred  claims  that  were  presented  for  confirmation  be- 
tween the  passage  of  this  act  and  February,  1816,  when 
the  commissioners  made  their  report,  eight  hundred 
were  rejected  ;  and  of  this  number,  it  is  probably  safe 
to  say  that  a  large  majority  were  either  notoriously 
fraudulent,  or  were  based  upon  evidence  that  failed  to 
establish  either  their  character  or  amount. 


11-4  MISSOURI. 

For  the  second  of  these  provisions,  that  by  virtue  of 
which  certain  lots  were  reserved  for  school  purposes,  we 
have  only  words  of  commendation.  Its  effect  has  been 
uniformly  beneficial ;  and  it  is  a  pleasure  to  be  able  to 
say  that  the  grant  has  never  been  perverted  from  its 
original  purpose,  but  that  its  sphere  of  usefulness  has 
gone  on  steadily  widening,  and  that  it  bids  fair  to  be 
productive  of  even  more  good  in  the  future  than  it  has 
been  in  the  ])ast.  It  is  no  doubt  true  that,  owing  to  sub- 
sequent legislation,  the  gift  was  somewhat  shorn  of  its 
fair  proportion  before  it  was  finally  handed  over  to  the 
State  in  1831 ;  but  in  spite  of  this  fact,  such  was  the 
number  of  these  unclaimed  lots,  and  so  great  has  been 
their  increase  in  value  in  certain  favored  localities,  that 
in  St.  Louis  alone  they  constitute  the  bulk  of  the  real 
estate  held  by  the  schools  for  purposes  of  revenue,  and 
furnish  to-day  an  income  which  may  be  roughly  esti- 
mated at  from  fifty  to  sixty  thousand  dollars  per  annum. 

For  this  magnificent  gift  the  people  of  St.  Louis,  and 
of  the  other  villages  which  shared  in  the  bounty  of  Con- 
gress, are  indebted  to  the  exertions  of  Thomas  F.  Rid- 
dick,  a  Virginian  by  birth,  and  one  of  the  earliest  immi- 
grants to  the  territory.  He  was  secretary  to  the  first 
boai'd  of  land  commissioners,  and  by  virtue  of  his  office 
became  cognizant  to  the  fact  that  there  were  in  each  of 
the  villages  in  the  territory  a  numb3r  of  lots  for  which 
no  legal  owners  could  be  found.  With  rare  foresight, 
he  conceived  the  idea  of  securing  them  as  the  beginning 
of  a  fund  for  the  support  of  common  schools,  and  in  ac- 
cordance with  his  suggestion  the  section  quoted  above, 
reserving  them  for  this  purpose,  was  inserted  in  the  act, 
the  primary  object  of  which  was  to  quiet  land  titles. 
When  the  proposition  came  before  Congress,  such  was 


LOUISIANA   TERRITORY.  115 

his  interest  in  its  success  that  he  made  the  trip  from 
St.  Louis  to  Washington  on  horseback,  and  at  his  own 
expense,  to  urge  its  passage  ;  and  it  was  owing  to  his 
exertions  and  those  of  Edward  Hempstead,  M'ho  then 
represented  the  territory,  that  it  finally  beci;nie  a  law. 

The  last  of  the  measures  to  which  we  find  it  necessary 
to  refer  at  this  time  was  the  act  of  Congress  of  June 
4,  1812,  by  which,  on  the  12th  of  the  December  follow- 
ing, Louisiana  was  to  be  advanced  from  the  first  to  the 
second  grade  of  territories,  and  its  name  changed  to 
Missouri.  It  was  time  that  this  change  should  come, 
for  the  territory  had  a  population  of  over  twenty  thou- 
sand, exclusive  of  Indians.  This  was  four  times  as 
many  as  were  necessary,  under  the  law  for  the  govern- 
ment of  the  Northwest  Territory,  to  entitle  them  to  the 
promotion,  and  they  had  begun  to  grow  restive  under  a 
mode  of  treatment  which  discriminated  unfavorably  be- 
tween them  and  tlieir  neighbors  on  the  other  side  of 
the  Mississippi.  By  the  terms  of  this  act,  the  territorial 
affairs  were  to  be  administered  by  a  governor  appointed 
by  tlie  President,  and  a  general  assembly  consisting  of 
a  house  of  representatives  elected  by  the  people,  and  a 
legislative  council  of  nine  members,  chosen  by  the  Pres- 
ident from  a  list  of  eighteen  returned  to  him  by  the  ter- 
ritorial house  of  representatives.  In  accordance  with 
this  law.  Governor  Howard  issued  a  proclamation  di- 
viding the  territory  into  five  counties  instead  of  districts, 
as  they  had  hitherto  been  called,  and  ordering  an  elec- 
tion to  be  held  in  the  November  following  for  a  dele- 
gate to  Congress,  and  for  members  of  the  territorial 
legislature.  It  was  one  of  the  last  of  his  official  acts, 
for  soon  after  he  was  appointed  a  brigadier-general  in 
the   army,  which  position  he  held  with  honor  to  him- 


116  MISSOURI. 

self  and  advantage  to  the  territory  until  his  death  in 
1814. 

After  an  interregnum  of  some  months,  during  which 
the  duties  of  the  office  were  satisfactorily  performed  by 
Frederick  Bates,  the  secretary  of  the  territory.  Captain 
William  Clark,  the  worthy  companion  of  Merriwether 
Lewis  in  the  expedition  to  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia, 
was  appointed  governor.  It  was  a  fortunate  selection 
in  view  of  the  hostile  relations  that  then  existed  between 
the  whites  and  the  tribes  of  the  Northwest,  and  it  was 
no  doubt  his  skill  in  dealing  with  these  people  and  the 
influence  he  had  acquired  over  them  that  led  to  his  ap- 
pointment. His  administration  proved  successful,  and 
he  was  continued  in  office  until  1820,  when  Missouri  be- 
came a  State,  though  it  was  a  year  and  more  before  she 
was  formally  admitted  into  the  Union.  At  the  election 
which  then  took  place,  Alexander  McNair  was  chosen 
governor,  but  General  Clark,  as  he  was  usually  called, 
was  still  kept  at  the  head  of  Indian  affairs,  and  it  was  in 
this  capacity  that  he  negotiated  the  treaties  of  1824-25, 
by  which  the  Osages,  Kickapoos,  and  Sacs  and  Foxes, 
relinquished  the  lands  which  they  still  held  within  the 
limits  of  the  State.  It  was  a  position  for  which  he  was 
preeminently  fitted,  for  with  perhaps  the  exception  of 
Sir  William  Johnston,  there  has  never  been  a  white  man 
whose  influence  among  these  wild  and  wayward  chil- 
dren of  the  forest  was  comparable  with  that  which  he 
wielded.  Up  to  the  day  of  his  death  in  1838,  he  was 
their  ti'ied  and  trusted  friend  and  counselor  ;  and  but 
few  of  them  ever  came  to  St.  Louis  (and  in  those  days 
such  an  occurrence  was  by  no  means  rare)  whose  first 
visit  was  not  made  to  the  ''  Red-head,"  the  name  by 
which  he  was  known  among  them. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

MISSOURI    TERRITORY  :    1813  TO  1821. 

During  the  eight  years  that  Governor  Clark  was  at 
the  head  of  affairs,  the  territory,  in  spite  of  certain 
drawbacks,  made  rapid  progress  in  wealth  and  popula- 
tion. For  a  year  or  two  at  the  outset  of  his  administra- 
tion, during  the  continuance  of  the  war  with  England, 
the  tide  of  immigration  was  somewhat  interrupted  ;  but 
on  the  return  of  peace  in  1815,  it  set  in  afresh  and  with 
increased  force.  In  fact,  so  great  was  the  rush  from 
Kentucky,  Tennessee,  Virginia,  and  the  Carolinas  that 
the  "  Missouri  Gazette "  of  October  26,  1816,  was 
moved  to  exclaim  that  "  a  stranger  witnessing  the  scene 
would  imagine  that  those  States  had  made  an  agree- 
ment to  introduce  the  territory  as  soon  as  possible  into 
the  bosom  of  the  American  family."  As  many  as  one 
hundred  persons  are  said  to  have  passed  through  St. 
Charles  in  one  day  "  on  their  way  to  Boone's  lick.  Salt 
River,  or  some  other  region  which  for  the  time  being 
was  the  centre  of  attraction  ;  "  and  this  rate  was  kept 
up  for  many  days  together."  Many  of  these  "  movers  " 
brought  with  tliem  a  hundred  head  of  cattle,  besides 
horses,  hogs,  and  sheep,  and  from  three  to  twenty  slaves. 
The  few  rude  ferries  that  were  then  in  existence  on  the 
Mississippi  were  kept  busy  crossing  them. 

As  one  of  these  long  trains  moved  slowly  thi'ough  the 
woods  or  over  the  prairie,  the  huge  wagons  drawn  by 


118  MISSOURI. 

four  or  six  horses  and  loaded  down  with  the  household 
goods  or  "plunder,"  as  it  was  called,  of  the  family  ;  the 
cattle  with  their  hundred  bells  ;  the  negroes,  who,  we 
are  told  "  seem  fond  of  their  masters,"  and  are  quite  as 
much  delighted  and  interested  in  the  migration ;  and, 
finally,  the  mistress  and  her  children  strolling  leisurely 
by  the  side  of  the  heavily  laden  teams,  "  often  stretch 
for  three  quarters  of  a  mile  or  more  along  the  road, 
and  present  a  scene  which  is  at  once  pleasing  and  patri- 
archal." As  night  comes  on,  the  band  halts  near  some 
creek  or  spring  where  there  is  a  supply  of  wood  and 
water.  "  The  pack  of  dogs  sets  up  a  cheerful  barking. 
The  cattle  lie  down  and  ruminate.  The  huge  wagons 
are  covered  so  that  the  roof  completely  excludes  the 
rain.  The  cooking  utensils  are  brought  out.  The 
blacks  prepare  a  supper  which  the  toils  of  the  day  ren- 
der delicious  ;  and  they  talk  over  the  adventures  of 
the  past  day,  and  the  prospects  of  the  next."  Mean- 
time they  are  going  where  the  land  is  inexhaustibly  fer- 
tile, and  "  where  there  is  nothing  but  buffaloes  and  deer 
to  limit  the  range  even  to  the  western  sea."  Well  might 
the  worthy  preacher,  in  view  of  such  a  picture,  exclaim 
that  "  it  carried  him  back  to  the  days  of  other  years 
and  to  the  pastoral  pursuits  of  those  ancient  races, 
whose  home  was  in  a  tent  wherever  their  flocks  found 
range."  ^ 

When  the  immigrant  arrived  at  his  journey's  end,  his 
first  business  was  to  look  out  a  suitable  spot  where  he 
might  open  a  farm  and  once  more  set  up  his  household 
gods.  This  was  not  always  an  easy  matter,  especially 
if  he  were  going  to  an  unknown  region  or  among  stran- 
gers, for  speculators  beset  his  path  at  every  turn  and 
1  Flint's  Hecollections,  p.  202. 


MISSOURI  TERRITORY.  119 

confused  him  with  glowing  accounts  of  their  own  lands, 
whilst,  at  the  same  time,  they  decried  the  possessions  of 
their  rivals  by  all  the  arts  known  to  the  profession. 
Amid  such  a  conflict  of  opinions,  and  in  view  of  the  di- 
versity of  claims  founded,  some  upon  settlement  and 
improvement  rights,  others  upon  Spanish  or  New  Mad- 
rid grants,  some  of  which  had  been  confirmed,  whilst 
others  had  not,  it  was  often  a  difficult  matter  to  decide  ; 
but  when,  at  last,  a  choice  was  made,  the  necessary  log- 
cabins  were  soon  raised,  the  neighbors  all  joining  in  and 
helping  on  the  work.  A  field  of  suitable  size  was  cleared 
and  fenced  after  the  Virginia  fashion,  and  at  the  proper 
season  a  crop  was  "  pitched."  In  due  time  it  was  har- 
vested, and  ever  after  the  Missouri  farmer,  with  a  mod- 
erate force,  if  gifted  with  health  and  possessed  of  a  fair 
share  of  industry,  was  sure  of  food,  shelter,  and  clothing, 
and  was  thus  "  as  independent  as  it  was  fit  that  a  man 
should  ever  get  to  be." 

It  is  true  that,  owing  to  their  abundance,  farm  prod- 
ucts were  often  in  but  little  demand,  and  that  hence 
money  was  scarce  and  but  little  of  it  ever  found  its  way 
into  his  possession ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  it  may  be 
urged  that  except  for  the  purchase  of  the  necessary  farm- 
ing implements  or  in  the  payment  of  his  taxes,  he  had 
but  little  use  for  it,  as  the  necessaries  of  life  and  many  of 
its  luxuries  were  within  his  reach  without  the  expendi- 
ture of  a  dollar  in  cash.  Thus,  for  example,  the  ma- 
terials for  his  clothing  were  grown  in  his  own  fields  or 
sheared  from  his  flocks,  and  their  preparation  and  man- 
ufacture were  among  the  duties  that  devolved  upon  the 
women  of  the  family ;  his  cabin  of  logs,  rude  at  first  and 
soon  replaced  by  the  more  ambitious  frame  house,  gave 
him  shelter  ;  while  the  woods  and  streams,  his  fields, 


120  MISSOURI. 

flocks,  and  well-filled  "  truck  patch  "  or  vegetable  garden, 
all  contributed  to  furnish  forth  a  table  that  was  as  abun- 
dant as  it  was  varied. 

Of  foreign  wines  and  brandies  he,  of  course,  had  none  ; 
but  in  a  few  years,  when  his  orchard  came  into  bear- 
ing, he  had  an  abundance  of  cider,  and  if  with  increasing 
years  he  felt  the  need  of  a  more  potent  stimulant,  he  was 
at  liberty  to  convert  the  nutritious  corn  or  the  fragrant 
peach  into  the  most  seductive  of  liquors,  without  the 
fear  of  a  visit  from  the  tax-gatherer.  Tea  and  coffee, 
too,  were  at  times  a  recollection  rather  than  a  reality, 
and  here,  it  must  be  confessed  that  the  ingenuity  of  the 
housewife  was  at  fault,  as  sassafras  and  rye  furnished  but 
poor  substitutes  for  these  well-nigh  indispensable  articles. 
However,  he  had  an  abundance  of  milk,  or  if  he  did  not, 
it  was  generally  his  own  fault ;  and  with  a  plentiful  supply 
of  maple  syrup  and  honey,  known  as  "  long  sweetening,'" 
he  had  no  reason  to  complain  of  the  absence  of  foreign 
sugar. 

Being  thus  relieved  from  the  dread  of  poverty,  the 
economic  restrictions  upon  marriage  that  prevail  in  old 
communities  had  no  existence  among  them,  and  a  pru- 
dent father  might  reasonably  expect  to  see  his  children 
comfortably  settled  about  him,  in  homes  of  their  own, 
long  before  his  own  days  of  usefulness  were  over.  Land 
was  cheap,  and  in  two  years  an  active,  energetic  young 
man  might,  by  his  own  exertions,  open  a  farm  and  be  in 
a  condition  to  support  a  wife  and  children.  After  this, 
the  necessity  for  persistent,  exhaustive  labor  would  not 
be  so  great,  as  it  was  "  calculated  "  that  two  days'  work 
in  Missouri  would  contribute  as  much  to  the  support  of 
a  family  as  the  labor  of  a  week  would  do  in  the  North. 
In  good  time  the  miller,  the  blacksmith,  and  the  country 


MISSOURI   TERRITORY.  121 

storekeeper  would  be  attracted  to  the  settlement,  and 
soon  the  school,  the  church,  and  the  i)ost-office  would 
follow.  At  this  stage  of  progress  the  community  would 
contain  within  itself  the  nucleus  of  the  coming  village 
and  be  virtually  self-supporting.  Soon  there  would  arise 
the  need  of  something  more  regular  and  authoritative 
than  neighborhood  law  or  custom,  powerful  as  that  was 
in  newly-settled  districts ;  and  steps  would  be  taken  for 
the  establishment  of  courts  and  the  enforcement  of  their 
decrees.  At  first  the  little  community  would  be  attached 
to  the  nearest  county  or  judicial  circuit,  with  the  seat  of 
justice  perhaps  a  hundred  miles  away,  but  this  was  a 
mere  temporary  expedient ;  and  when,  sooner  or  later, 
the  requisite  population  was  attained,  a  suitable  extent 
of  territory  would  be  cut  off  and  erected  into  a  county, 
with  judges,  rej^resentatives,  and  all  the  other  officers 
necessary  to  a  separate  political  life. 

Such,  in  brief,  was  the  process  by  which  neighbor- 
hoods grew,  and  ultimately  became  welded  into  counties  ; 
and  some  idea  of  the  rate  at  which  this  was  going  on 
within  the  territory  may  be  formed  from  the  fact  that, 
between  1812  and  1820,  the  counties  had  increased  from 
five  to  fifteen,  and  the  population,  exclusive  of  Arkansas, 
which  in  1810  amounted  to  twenty  thousand  souls,  now 
numbered  over  sixty-six  thousand,  of  whom  about  ten 
thousand  were  slaves. 

Of  this  increase,  amounting  in  the  ten  years  to  over 
two  hundred  per  cent.,  a  large  majority  were  farmers, 
and  the  gain  in  population,  therefore,  was  chiefly  in  the 
agricultural  regions,  though  the  villages  also  felt  the  im- 
pulse and  shared  in  the  general  prosperity.  Especially 
was  this  true  of  St.  Louis,  which,  owing  to  its  advanta- 
geous situation,  and  to  the  fact  that  it  was  the  political 


122  MISSOURI. 

capital  of  the  territory  as  well  as  the  depot  for  the  pur- 
chase and  distribution  of  supplies  for  the  different  mili- 
tary and  trading-posts  on  the  upper  rivers,  soon  acquired 
a  lead  which  it  has  ever  since  retained.  In  1804,  at  the 
time  of  the  purchase,  there  were  in  the  village  one  hun- 
dred and  eighty  houses,  consisting  ordinarily  of  but  one 
room,  and  built  after  the  French  fashion,  which  differed 
from  the  American  in  the  fact  that  the  logs,  instead  of 
being  laid  horizontally,  were  set  upright  in  the  ground, 
or  upon  plates,  and  were  then  connected  by  cross-pieces, 
the  interstices  in  each  case  being  filled  in  with  stones 
and  mud.  A  few  of  these  houses,  as  for  instance  those 
of  the  Chouteaus  and  the  government  buildings,  were  of 
stones  laid  rough  cast  and  coated  with  mortar  ;  and  as 
they  were  "inclosed  with. massive  stone  walls  like  a 
demi-fortress,"  they  may  well  have  been  regarded  as 
palaces  when  compared  with  the  more  humble  dwellings 
by  which  they  were  surrounded.  All,  however,  were 
alike  in  haying  porches  on  one  or  more  sides ;  and  as 
they  were  all  whitewashed  and  usually  stood  in  gardens, 
surrounded  by  fruit-trees,  they  appeared  beautiful  when 
seen  from  a  distance,  though  most  of  them  "  were  mean 
and  comfortless  when  contemplated  near  at  hand." 

As  soon  as  the  United  States  came  into  possession  of 
all  this  region,  "  the  influence  of  the  guardian  spirit  of 
liberty,"  whatever  that  may  mean,  is  said  to  have  made 
itself  felt,  and  the  place  rapidly  lost  the  distinctive  fea- 
tures of  a  French  village.  In  1809  it  was  incorporated 
as  a  town,  and  before  the  close  of  the  second  decade  of 
the  century  there  arose  "  lines  of  brick  houses  that  would 
not  have  disgraced  Philadelphia."  By  actual  count  it 
was  found  that  in  the  spring  of  1821  there  were  two 
hundred   and   thirty-two  dwelling-houses   of  brick    and 


MISSOURI   TERRITORY.  123 

stone  in  the  village  as  against  four  hundred  and  nine- 
teen of  wood,  to  say  nothing  of  warehouses,  stables, 
shops,  and  outbuildings.  Land,  too,  had  increased  enor- 
mously in  value,  and  a  few  of  the  old  French  settlers, 
hostile  as  they  were  at  first  to  the  new  r%ime,  by  pru- 
dently investing  their  savings  in  this  form  of  projierty, 
had  reaped  the  benefit  of  the  advance,  and  were  com- 
paratively rich. 

To  facilitate  intercourse  between  different  parts  of  the 
territory,  roads  were  cut  out ;  ])ost-offices,  too,  were  es- 
tablished, and  routes  opened  between  the  different  vil- 
lages and  the  east,  though  it  was  many  years  before  the 
arrival  and  departure  of  the  mails  became  either  frequent 
or  regular.  In  July,  1808,  a  newspaper  was  established, 
which  under  different  names  has  continued  down  to  the 
present  time,  and  is  now  known  as  the  "  Missouri  Repub- 
lican." It  was  the  first  paper  published  west  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi River,  but  not  the  first  in  Louisiana,  as  one  had 
been  issued  in  New  Orleans  as  early  as  1794,  while  the 
Spaniards  were  yet  in  possession  of  that  portion  of  the 
valley. 

A  few  good  private  libraries  seem  to  have  existed  in 
the  territory  from  the  earliest  times,  notably  that  of 
Colonel  Auguste  Chouteau,  which  is  said  to  have  been 
strong  in  works  relating  to  the  early  history  of  America, 
and  was  probably  made  up  of  books  sent  from  France 
for  the  Jesuit  College  at  Kaskaskia.  It  was  not  much 
used,  if  we  may  credit  contemporary  evidence  ;  and  for 
some  years  after  the  purchase,  but  few  new  books  were 
brought  into  the  territory.  To  this  rule,  though,  there 
must  have  been  some  honorable  exceptions,  as  the  li- 
brary of  Mr.  Secretary,  Frederick  Bates  is  spoken  of 
with  commendation,  and  in  1820  Bishop  Dubourg  is  cred- 


124  MISSOURI. 

ited  with  having  gathered  together  some  eight  thousand 
vohimes.  Besides  this  hbrary,  he  had  secured  for  the 
new  cathedrah  which  was  then  in  course  of  erection,  a 
"  collection  of  sacred  vases,  ornaments,  embroideries, 
and  paintings  "  that  is  said  to  have  been  without  a  rival 
in  the  United  States.  Among  the  paintings  there  were, 
so  we  are  told,  "  originals  by  Raphael,  Rubens,  Guido, 
Paul  Veronese,  as  well  as  by  the  modern  masters  of  the 
Italian,  French,  and  Flemish  schools."  It  was  also  dur- 
ing this  period  that  Governor  Clark  made  a  collection 
illustrative  of  the  arts  and  industries  of  the  Indians, 
which  was  open  to  the  public,  and  which,  to-day,  would 
be  of  incalculable  value  to  the  ethnologist. 

Limited  as  was  the  supply  of  reading  matter,  it  was 
fully  equal  to  the  demand,  for  among  the  old  French 
settlers  there  was  a  large  proportion  who  could  not  read, 
and  the  new-comers  were  so  busy  making  farms,  specu- 
lating in  lands,  and  otherwise  providing  for  their  tem- 
poral wants,  that  they  had  no  time  to  indulge  in  the 
luxury  of  reading.  But  while  they  were  thus  careless 
of  their  own  literary  improvement,  they  were  by  no 
means  neglectful  of  the  education  of  their  children. 
Upon  this  point  they  displayed  a  commendable  anxiety, 
and  there  were  but  few  settlements  in  the  territory  so 
insignificatit  that  they  did  not  have,  during  some  part  of 
the  year,  a  school,  in  which  reading,  writing,  and  a  little 
arithmetic  were  taught.  A  lady  who  had  resided  two 
years  at  Fort  Osage,  some  two  hundred  miles  up  the 
Missouri  River,  told  Brackenridge  "  that  descending  the 
river  on  her  return  from  that  place,  she  had  observed  on 
the  very  spot,  where  on  ascending  she  had  seen  a  herd 
of  deer,  several  children  with  books  in  their  hands,  re- 
turning from  school."     The  settlement,  it  is  added,  had 


MISSOURI  TERRITORY.  125 

been  formed,  and  the  school  opened,  during  the  two  yeai's 
that  she  had  lived  at  the  fort. 

According  to  the  same  writer  there  were  in  1811  two 
schools  in  St.  Louis,  one  English  and  one  French  ;  and 
from  other  sources  we  learn  that  the  former  was  "  kept  " 
by  George  Tompkins,  who  afterwards  became  chief  jus- 
tice of  the  State,  and  the  latter  by  Jean  Baptiste  Tru- 
deau,  whose  career  as  a  teacher,  extending  from  1774 
to  about  1825,  covers  a  period  of  fifty  years.  Although 
only  two  are  mentioned,  yet  there  must  have  been  others, 
as  it  was  about  this  time  that  the  "  Missouri  Gazette  " 
contained  the  advertisement  of  the  erratic  C.  F.  Schewe, 
a  graduate  of  the  College  of  Berlin  and  of  the  Saxony 
School  of  Mines,  who  seems  to  have  divided  his  time 
between  teaching  French  and  German  and  "  moulding- 
candles  out  of  deer's  tallow."  There  were  also  Lancas- 
trian schools,  Pestalozzi  establishments,  and  institutions 
for  "  inst7'Uction  7mituelle."  Hebrew  was  taught  in 
twelve  lessons,  and  Latin  and  Greek  with  equal  dis- 
patch, by  professors  whose  knowledge  of  even  their  own 
mother  tongue  was  exceedingly  limited.  Dancing,  es- 
pecially the  waltz,  —  then  just  introduced,  —  fencing 
and  music  (the  piano  and  clarinet)  were  also  taught ; 
and  in  a  young  ladies'  academy,  in  addition  to  French 
and  English  grammar,  geography,  and  arithmetic,  the 
pupils  were  instructed  in  sewing  and  embi'oidery,  and 
"their  minds  were  enliglitened  and  their  hearts  formed 
by  a  course  of  select  reading  either  in  ancient  or  modern 
history  or  morality." 

Of  course  these  were  all  private  institutions,  as  was 
the  college  founded  by  Bishop  Dubourg,  from  which 
the  St.  Louis  University  may  be  said  to  have  sprung. 
As  yet  there  was  no  such  thing  in  the  territory  as  a 


12G  MISSOURI. 

public  school.  Not  until  1838,  and  after  much  tribula- 
tion, was  one  opened  in  St.  Louis,  though  in  1817  the 
first  step  was  taken  towards  organizing  the  system  which 
has  since  grown  into  such  magnificent  proportions,  by- 
incorporating  a  board  of  trustees,  whose  duty  it  was  to 
superintend  the  schools  of  that  town. 

In  1811,  at  the  time  of  Brackenridge's  visit,  the  popu- 
lation of  St.  Louis  amounted  to  about  fourteen  hundred, 
and  was  composed  of  Canadian  French,  a  few  Spaniards 
and  other  Europeans,  with  a  somewhat  larger  propor- 
tion of  Americans,  to  which  may  be  added  a  slight 
sprinkling  of  Indians,  half-breeds,  and  negro  slaves.  It 
was  a  motley  crowd,  and  they  differed  among  themselves 
as  much  in  appearance,  character,  and  occupation,  as 
they  did  in  nationality.  Here  might  be  seen  the  French 
'paysan  and  the  American  farmer  who  was  destined  so 
soon  to  supersede  him  ;  the  boisterous,  bragging,  fight- 
ing boatman  of  the  lower  Mississippi  and  the  gay,  good- 
humored  voyageur  from  Canada  and  the  upper  rivers. 
"  Vagrant  Indians  still  loitered  along  the  streets,  and 
now  and  then  a  stark  Kentucky  hunter,"  —  the  veritable 
gamecock  of  the  wilderness,  —  "  with  rifle  on  shoulder 
and  knife  in  belt,  strode  along.  Here  and  there  were 
new  houses  and  shops  just  set  up  by  bustling,  driving, 
and  eager  men  of  traffic  from  the  Atlantic  States  ;  while, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  old  French  mansions  with  open 
casements  still  retained  the  easy,  indolent  air  of  the 
original  colonists ;  and  now  and  then  the  scraping  of  a 
fiddle,  or  strain  of  an  ancient  French  song,  or  sound  of 
billiard  balls  showed  that  the  happy  Gallic  turn  for 
gayety  and  amusement  still  lingered  about  the  place." 
In  appearance  the  town  is  said  to  have  been  less  like 
a  rural  village  than  Ste.  Genevieve  or  any  of  the  other 


MISSOURI  TERRITORY'.  127 

French  settlements,  as  the  inhal>itants  depended  npon 
trade  for  their  support  rather  than  upon  agriculture. 
Indeed,  it  was  owing  to  this  fact,  and  to  the  scarcity 
which,  in  early  times,  it  had  sometimes  occasioned,  that 
St.  Louis  was  derisively  styled  by  its  more  fortunate 
neighbors  Fain  court,  or  "  short  loaf,"  as  it  may  be 
roughly  translated.  We  are  also  told  that  the  town 
contained  ''  twelve  mercantile  stores,"  and  that  the  value 
of  its  imports  amounted  to  two  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  dollars  per  annum,  which  amount  probably 
represents  rather  more  than  half  the  cost  of  all  the 
goods  annually  brought  into  the  territoiy.  Except  the 
sixty  thousand  dollars  which  the  troops  stationed  at 
Belle  Fontaine,  near  St.  Louis,  yearly  put  in  circulation, 
almost  all  the  rest  of  the  domestic  trade  of  this  region 
was  still  carried  on  by  barter.  Lead  and  its  product  in 
the  shape  of  shot,  and  peltry  were  most  in  demand,  for 
the  reason  that,  practically  they  were  monopolies,  and 
besides  furnishing  a  recognized  currency  for  the  country, 
they  were  the  two  articles  most  eagerly  sought  after  for 
shipment,  as,  no  matter  what  the  condition  of  the  mar- 
ket in  New  Orleans  or  the  Atlantic  cities  in  regard  to 
the  other  products  of  the  territory,  they  always  com- 
manded a  ready  sale  at  fair  prices. 

Of  the  former  of  these  articles,  it  was  estimated  that 
the  Maramec  mines  alone  produced,  annually,  one  mill- 
ion five  hundred  thousand  pounds,  and  "  gave  employ- 
ment to  three  hundred  and  fifty  hands,  exclusive  of 
smelters,  blacksmiths,  and  others."  The  Dubuque  mines 
were  not  worked  at  this  time,  but  those  on  the  opposite 
side  of  the  river,  near  Prairie  du  Chien,  were  ;  and  it 
may,  perhaps,  interest  those  of  us  who  are  concerned 
about  the  future  of  the  Indians  to  know  that,  in  1811, 


128  MISSOURI. 

the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  who  still  held  the  region  where 
these  "  diggings  "  were  situated,  "  having  no  other  In- 
strument but  the  hoe,"  made  five  hundred  thousand 
pounds  of  lead,  which  they  sold  to  the  traders,  and  which 
ultimately  found  its  way  down  the  river.  A  fair  share  of 
the  lead  produced  In  the  territory  was  cast  into  shot,  a 
tower  for  that  purpose  having  been  erected  on  a  river 
bluff  between  Ste.  Genevieve  and  St.  Louis,  as  early  as 
1809,  by  J.  Maklot,  who  seems  to  have  been  the  pioneer 
in  this  business.  His  shot  is  said  to  have  equaled  the 
best  English  patent ;  and  In  the  newspaper  of  that  day 
the  opinion  is  expressed  that  he  would  "  be  able  to  supply 
the  Atlantic  States  on  such  terms  as  would  defeat  com- 
petition." 

The  fur-trade,  too,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  amounted 
in  1804  to  two  hundred  thousand  dollars  per  annum, 
was  prosecuted  with  much  vigor,  though  there  Is  reason 
to  believe  that  it  was  hardly  as  profitable  as  It  had  once 
been,  and  that  Its  Increase  had  not  been  commensurate 
with  the  growth  of  the  commerce  of  the  territory  In  other 
respects.  In  1807-8,  one  year  after  the  return  of  Lewis 
and  Clark  from  their  journey  to  the  mouth  of  the  Col- 
umbia River,  Manuel  Lisa,  an  experienced  Indian  trader, 
and  one  *'  who  had  few  equals  In  perseverance  and  In- 
dustry," wintered  on  the  Yellowstone  at  the  mouth  of 
the  Big  Horn.  The  next  year,  a  company  with  a  capi- 
tal of  forty  thousand  dollars  was  formed  for  the  purpose 
of  "  monopolizing,"  as  It  was  said,  "  the  trade  of  the 
tribes  of  the  lower  Missouri,  who  understand  the  art  of 
trapping,  and  of  sending  a  party  to  the  head  waters  of 
that  stream,  strong  enough  to  defend  Itself  in  case  of 
necessity,  and  which  should  engage,  practically,  In  the 
work  of  taklno-  beaver  and  other  skins."     This  was  a 


MISSOURI   TERRITORY.  129 

decided  innovation,  or  rather  an  improvement,  for  hith- 
erto this  branch  of  the  business  had  been  left  almost 
altogether  to  the  Indians,  the  trader  being  obliged  to 
take  the  furs  as  they  were  brought  to  him,  or  to  go  with- 
out. Of  course,  so  long  as  this  was  the  case,  there  was 
always  an  element  of  risk  growing  out  of  the  competition 
of  the  traders,  and  the  in-egular  and  uncertain  habits  of 
the  Indians  ;  and  it  was  to  remedy  this  evil  that  the 
company  proposed  to  employ  white  men,  regularly,  in 
the  work  of  hunting  and  trapping,  thei'eby  giving  to 
these  pursuits  a  degree  of  stability  which,  thus  far,  they 
had  not  possessed.  Accordingly,  in  1809,  Mr.  Henry, 
one  of  the  partners,  started  up  the  Missouri  River  at  the 
head  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  men,  and  after  establish- 
ing small  trading-posts  among  the  Sioux,  the  Arickaras, 
Mandans,  and  other  tribes,  he  proceded  to  the  three  forks 
of  the  river,  where  he  built  a  fort,  and  began  at  once 
the  business  of  hunting  and  trapping  as  well  as  trading. 
It  was  a  magnificent  scheme,  and  one  which  promised  a 
large  measure  of  success,  but  unfortunately  for  the  com- 
pany, all  their  plans  miscarried  ;  and  after  a  series  of 
unforeseen  misfortunes,  the  partnership  was  dissolved  at 
the  end  of  the  time  for  which  it  had  been  formed.  In 
spite  of  this  apparent  failure,  the  company,  thanks  to  the 
energy  of  Lisa,  saved  its  original  investment,  and  began 
life  afresh  with  a  slightly  increased  capital.  It  met 
with  no  better  success,  however,  and  after  a  precarious 
existence  of  a  few  years,  it  gave  way,  in  1819,  to  still 
another,  the  third  company,  which  is  said  to  have  bought 
it  out  for  ten  thousand  dollars.  At  this  time,  if  we  may 
credit  the  report  of  Major  Biddle,  the  whole  amount 
of  capital  embarked  in  the  fur-trade  of  the  Missouri 
amounted  to  barely  fifty-three  thousand  dollars,  seven- 


130  MISSOURI. 

teen  thousand  of  which,  including  the  plant,  belonged 
to  the  company,  whilst  the  rest  was  owned  by  a  number 
of  individuals,  among  whom  the  Chouteaus  were  prom- 
inent. From  these  figures  it  is  evident  that  the  trade 
had  not  made  any  great  increase,  for  even  if  a  possible 
profit  of  five  hundred  per  cent,  be  allowed,  it  would  only 
carry  the  total  to  about  three  hundred  thousand  dollars  ; 
and  it  is  probable  that  this  amount  would  cover,  not 
only  the  receipts  from  the  Missouri,  but  those  from  all 
other  sources. 

To  carry  on  this  commerce,  and  transport  the  farm 
products,  live  stock,  etc.,  that  were  annually  sent  down 
the  river,  various  kinds  of  craft,  as  for  instance  the  keel- 
boat,  the  barge,  and  the  flatboat  or  "  broad  horn,"  were 
called  into  requisition.  Of  these,  the  two  first  mentioned 
were  the  most  important,  though  not,  perhaps,  the  most 
numerous,  as  they  could  be  used  for  a  return  trip,  whilst 
the  flatboat  could  not,  and  was,  therefore,  broken  up  and 
sold  at  the  end  of  the  voyage. 

Some  of  these  boats  were  of  good  size,  carried  as  much 
as  forty  or  fifty  tons,  and  were  owned  and  run  by  men 
who  acted  as  "  patrons  "  or  captains,  and  who  made  the 
transj^ortation  of  freight  and  passengei'S  a  regular  busi- 
ness. In  manning  them  it  was  the  custom  to  proportion 
the  number  of  the  crew  to  the  size  of  the  cargo,  one 
hand  being  allowed  for  every  three  thousand  pounds. 
A  trip  from  St.  Louis  to  New  Orleans  and  back  usually 
occupied  from  four  to  six  months,  the  upward  voyage 
being  especially  long,  laborious,  and  by  no  means  free 
from  danger.  Even  with  the  aid  of  sails  and  oars,  it 
could  not  be  made  in  less  than  an  average  of  ninety 
days.  Besides  these  means  of  propulsion,  the  crew  were 
often  obliged  to  resort  to  "  warping,  cordcUing,  poling," 


MISSOURI  TERRITORY.  131 

and,  when  the  occasion  offered,  to  a  process  known  as 
''  bushwhacking,"  or  pulling  the  boat  forward  by  means 
of  the  bushes  and  willows  that  grew  along  the  shore.  It 
was  a  hard  life,  full  of  toil  and  danger,  and  developed  a 
class  of  men  each  one  of  whom,  in  the  vernacular  of  the 
river,  claimed  to  be  "  half  a  horse  and  half  an  alligator." 

In  truth,  they  were  a  wild  and  reckless  set,  ever  ready 
for  a  fight  or  a  frolic  ;  but  to  their  credit  be  it  spoken 
they  were  honest  and  true  and  patient  after  their  fashion 
under  labors  and  privations  that  would  have  daunted 
less  resolute  spirits.  The  best  man  in  every  crew  was 
entitled  to  wear  a  feather  or  some  other  emblem  as  a 
challenge,  which  he  was  bound  to  make  good  against  all 
comers  ;  and  the  worthy  Mr.  Flint,  on  the  occasion  of 
his  first  visit  to  St.  Louis,  was  surprised  to  learn  that  the 
term  "  best  "  had  no  reference  to  the  moral  qualities  of 
the  possessor,  but  that  it  meant  "  he  who  had  beaten,  or, 
in  the  Kentucky  phrase,  had  whipped  all  the  rest." 

Such  were  the  men  and  the  methods  employed  in  car- 
rying on  the  commerce  of  the  valley  when,  in  December, 
1811,  the  New  Orleans,  the  first  steamboat  built  west 
of  the  Alleghany  Mountains,  made  the  trip  from  Pitts- 
burgh to  New  Orleans,  and  thus  settled  at  once  and  for- 
ever the  question  of  the  use  of  steam  as  a  motive  power 
upon  the  Western  waters.  Although  the  career  of  this 
vessel  was  very  short,  yet  so  satisfied  were  the  people  of 
the  Ohio  valley  with  the  result  of  the  experiment,  that 
they  went  into  the  business  of  boat-building  with  an 
energy  that  must  have  savored  of  recklessness  to  any 
one  not  acquainted  with  the  volume  of  trade  that  annu- 
ally floated  down  the  Mississippi.  In  the  eight  years 
that  intervened  between  1811  and  1819,  sixty-three 
steamers,  varying  in  capacity  from  twenty  to  some  hun- 


132  MISSOURI. 

dreds  of  tons,  were  constructed  and  running  upon  the 
Western  rivers,  and  of  these  fifty-six  were  built  on 
the  Ohio,  four  at  New  Orleans,  and  one  each  at  Phila- 
delphia, New  York,  and  Providence,  R.  I. 

Rapid  as  was  the  increase  in  the  number,  size,  and 
speed  of  these  vessels,  at  first  and  for  several  years  they 
found  employment  only  on  the  Ohio  and  the  lower  Mis- 
sissippi, and  it  was  not  until  the  2d  of  August,  1817,  that 
the  General  Pike,  Jacob  Read  master,  the  first  steam- 
boat that  ever  ascended  the  Mississippi  above  the  mouth 
of  the  Ohio,  arrived  at  St.  Louis. 

From  the  description  that  has  come  down  to  us,  she 
must  have  been  an  ungainly  sort  of  craft,  with  a  hold 
constructed  on  the  model  of  a  barge,  and  a  cabin  situ- 
ated on  the  lower  deck  inside  of  the  ''  running  boards." 
She  had  no  wheel-houses  and  but  one  smoke-stack. 
The  motive  power  was  furnished  by  a  low-pressure  en- 
gine, reinforced  occasionally  by  the  exertions  of  the 
crew,  who  pushed  the  boat  along  with  poles  much  as 
they  had  been  accustomed  to  do  with  barges.  She  did 
not  run  at  night,  and  this  may  partially  account  for  the 
length  of  time  she  was  on  the  way.  In  the  course  of 
the  next  few  months  she  made  other  trips  to  and  from 
Louisville,  and  in  much  better  time.  In  October  of  the 
same  year,  another  steamer,  the  Constitution,  also 
reached  St.  Louis.  During  the  ensuing  season  of  1818, 
these  arrivals  and  departures  were  more  numerous, 
some  of  them  from  New  Orleans,  and  the  sight  of  a 
steamboat  soon  became  so  common  as  no  longer  to  ex- 
cite the  curiosity  of  the  dwellers  on  the  banks  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi. As  yet  no  attempt  had  been  made  to  ascend 
the  Missouri,  and  such  was  the  swiftness  of  that  stream 
that  the  result  of  an  effort  to  stem  its  mighty  current 


MISSOURI  TERRITORY.  133 

was  awaited  with  some  anxiety,  not  to  say  doubt.  At 
length  the  feat  was  accomplished  ;  and  the  return  in 
June,  1819,  of  the  Independence,  Captain  Nelson,  from 
Old  Franklin,  a  town  situated  about  one  hundred  and 
fifty  miles  up  the  river  and  long  since  washed  away,  led 
to  an  outburst  in  the  "  Missouri  Gazette,"  in  which  it  was 
said  :  "  The  IMissouri  has  hitherto  resisted  almost  effectu- 
ally all  attempts  at  navigation ;  she  has  opposed  every 
obstacle  she  could  to  the  tide  of  emigration  which  was 
rolling  up  her  banks  and  dispossessing  her  dear  red  chil- 
dren, but  her  white  children,  although  children  by  adop- 
tion, have  become  so  numerous,  and  are  increasing  so 
rapidly,  that  she  is  at  last  obliged  to  yield  them  her 
favor.  The  first  attempt  to  ascend  her  by  steamboat 
has  succeeded,  and  we  anticipate  the  day  as  speedy, 
when  the  Missouri  will  be  as  familiar  to  steamboats  as 
the  Mississippi  or  Ohio." 

With  the  gradual  increase  in  population  and  the  con- 
sequent growth  in  the  agriculture,  commerce,  and  other 
material  interests  of  the  territory,  the  necessity  for  a 
better  system  of  currency  became  daily  more  apparent. 
Lead,  peltry,  and  tobacco,  which  had  furnished  the  prin- 
cipal mediums  of  exchange  during  the  days  of  the  Span- 
ish regime,  and  useful  as  they  still  were  in  the  way  of 
barter,  were  no  longer  adequate  to  the  demands  made 
upon  them,  though  as  late  as  the  winter  of  1807  transac- 
tions were  made  upon  the  basis  of  a  payment  in  furs. 
Even  the  supply  of  small  change  was  totally  insufficient, 
and  Spanish  dollars  cut  up  into  halves,  quarters,  and 
eighths  or  "  bits  "  were  made  to  do  duty  in  this  respect. 
For  any  less  amount,  pins,  needles,  sheets  of  writing- 
paper,  and  other  articles  of  small  value  were  used. 

To  remedy  this  evil,  the  territorial  legislature  char- 


134  MISSOURI. 

tered  the  Bank  of  St.  Louis,  which  went  into  operation 
in  the  summer  of  1816,  and  in  the  following  year  the 
Bank  of  Missouri,  with  a  capital  of  two  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  dollars,  was  also  organized.  A  partial 
list  of  the  stockholders  of  this  latter  concern  is  pre- 
served, and  it  is  of  interest  as  showing  the  part  which 
the  French  element  of  the  population  still  played  in  the 
monetary  affairs  of  the  territory.  Out  of  seven  hun- 
dred and  eighty  shares  held  in  the  city  of  St.  Louis,  two 
hundred  and  seventy-six  belonged  to  persons  who  were 
unmistakably  French,  or  of  French  descent  ;  and  among 
them  we  recognize  the  name  of  Charles  Dehault  Delas- 
sus  as  a  subscriber  for  five  shares. 

For  a  time  the  community  felt  the  benefit  of  these 
institutions,  and  the  volume  of  business  was  increased 
by  the  flood  of  money  which  they  poured  into  the  chan- 
nels of  trade.  The  merchants  not  only  imported  more 
largely  of  goods  and  wares,  but  the  spirit  of  speculation 
in  land,  which  was  already  rife,  received  additional 
momentum.  The  people  of  the  territory,  one  and  all, 
appeared  to  be  possessed  with  a  mania  for  it.  No  claim 
was  so  indefinite,  no  title  so  uncertain,  and  no  piece  of 
l^roperty  so  shadowy,  as  not  to  find  a  purchaser.  A 
tract  of  land,  the  only  description  of  which  was  that  it 
was  situated  thirty  miles  north  of  St.  Louis,  was  put  up 
at  auction  and  actually  bid  off.  Sometimes  the  same 
tract  was  offered  by  two  or  three  claimants,  and  on  one 
occasion  the  whole  county  of  St.  Charles,  containing 
several  thousand  inhabitants,  was  sold  for  thirteen  hun- 
dred dollars  under  a  grant  that  had  never  been  con- 
firmed. The  immigrants,  who  were  pouring  into  the  ter- 
ritory in  such  a  continuous  stream,  were  possessed  by  the 
usual  Anglo-Saxon  land-hunger,  and  bought,  or  "  took 


Jf/SSOURI   TERRITORY.  135 

up,"  more  than  they  needed  or  could  pay  cash  for,  trust- 
ing to  the  future  to  be  able  to  sell  out  at  a  profit  and  in 
time  to  meet  their  engagements.  At  this  period,  govern- 
ment lands  were  sold  at  two  dollars  per  acre,  one  fourth 
cash  and  the  balance  in  two,  three,  and  four  years,  so  that 
to  enter  a  quarter  section  of  one  hundred  and  sixty  acres 
required  only  a  cash  payment  of  eighty  dollars.  This 
was  a  temptation  too  strong  to  be  resisted  by  the  average 
immigrant,  and  consequently  we  are  told  that,  for  every 
eighty  dollars  brought  into  the  territory,  a  quarter  sec- 
tion was  taken  up,  upon  which  two  hundred  and  forty 
dollars,  three  fourths  of  the  jjurohase  money,  was  un- 
paid. The  dealings  with  the  stores,  too,  were  largely 
increased,  and  were  also  upon  credit,  for  with  money  in 
abundance,  the  merchant  could  afford  to  be  liberal,  and 
customers  bought  recklessly,  as  ''  every  one  expected  to 
get  rich  out  of  the  future  emigrant.  The  speculator 
was  to  sell  him  houses  and  lands,  and  the  farmer  was  to 
sell  him  everything  he  wanted  to  begin  with  and  to  live 
ujion  until  he  could  supply  himself.  Towns  were  laid 
out  all  over  the  country,  and  lots  were  purchased  by 
every  one  on  credit ;  the  town-maker  received  no  money 
for  his  lots,  but  he  received  notes  of  hand  which  he  con- 
sidered to  be  as  good  as  cash ;  and  he  lived  and  em- 
barked in  other  ventures  as  if  they  had  been  cash  in 
truth." 

In  this  way  the  year  1818  found  almost  everybody 
in  debt,  but  this  made  no  difference  as  long  as  immi- 
grants continued  to  arrive,  and  bank-notes,  good,  bad, 
and  indifferent,  circulated  freely  and  without  question. 
But  when  about  1819  settling  day  rolled  around,  and 
the  stringency  in  the  Eastern  money  market  prevented 
the  people  who  were  desirous  of  immigrating  from  sell- 


136  MISSOURI. 

ing  tlieir  lands,  the  flow  of  Eastern  capital  westward 
was  checked,  and  as  a  consequence  the  local  institutions 
were  unahle  to  respond  to  the  demands  made  upon  them 
by  the  United  States  Bank  for  specie,  and  were  forced 
into  suspension  or  hopeless  bankruptcy. 

The  merchants,  feeling  the  pressure,  called  for  a  set- 
tlement of  their  outstanding  claims,  but  in  vain.  Bank- 
notes had  driven  out  the  specie,  and  as  they  were  now 
worthless,  there  was  no  longer  any  money  in  the  coun- 
try with  which  to  make  payment.  Farm  products,  it 
is  true,  were  abundant,  but  they  were  unsalable.  So, 
also,  was  real  estate  ;  and  then  was  presented  the  sin- 
gular spectacle  of  a  people  living  in  the  midst  of  a 
rude  plenty,  who  were  practically  without  a  circulating 
medium.  They  did  not  even  have  the  means  to  pay 
their  taxes  ;  and  those  of  them  who  were  so  unfortunate 
as  to  owe  a  balance  on  their  farms,  be  it  ever  so  small, 
saw  no  way  of  saving  them  from  forfeiture.  At  this 
stage  of  the  crisis  the  general  government  came  to  the 
rescue,  and  devised  "  a  system  of  relief  which,  by  extend- 
ing the  time  of  payment,  and  authorizing  purchasers  to 
secure  a  portion  of  their  lands  by  relinquishing  the  re- 
mainder to  the  government,  in  the  course  of  eight  years 
extinguished  a  large  portion  of  those  debts,  and  eventu- 
ally .  .  .  absorbed  the  whole  without  injury  to  the  citi- 
zen, and  with  little  loss  to  the  government."  The  legis- 
lature, too,  that  had  been  called  into  existence  by  the 
enabling  act  of  1820,  not  to  be  behindhand  in  the  work 
of  relief,  passed  stay  laws,  and  endeavored  to  accomplish 
the  impossible  feat  of  paying  something  with  nothing. 
Among  the  other  measures  to  which  they  resorted  was 
the  issue,  in  sums  varying  from  fifty  cents  to  ten  dollars, 
of  some  two  hundred  thousand  dollars'  worth  of  certifi- 


MISSOURI  TERRITORY.  137 

cates,  which  were  predicated  upon  the  credit  of  the  State, 
and  were  to  be  loaned  by  commissioners,  appointed  for 
the  purpose,  to  the  citizens  of  the  several  '•  loan  dis- 
tricts," upon  certain  conditions.  These  certificates  were 
made  receivable  "  not  only  for  taxes  and  debts  of  what- 
ever kind  due  the  State,  but  for  the  salaries  and  fees  of 
all  oflBcers,  civil  and  military,  and  in  payment  of  salt 
sold  by  the  lessees  of  Salt  Springs." 

Owing  to  losses  sustained  by  reason  of  insufficient  se- 
curity, and  to  the  adverse  decision  of  the  courts  as  to 
the  constitutionality  of  the  act  under  which  they  were 
issued,  these  certificates  were  discredited  almost  as  soon 
as  they  were  put  in  circulation ;  and  when  they  ceased 
to  pass  current,  the  holders  of  them  were  in  a  worse  con- 
dition than  they  were  before.  Probably  in  no  part  of 
the  West  was  the  scarcity  of  money  and  the  consequent 
derangement  of  business  more  keenly  felt  than  in  Mis- 
souri. Her  people  had  been  so  generally  engaged  in 
speculative  enterprises,  and  had  so  uniformly  conducted 
their  affairs  upon  a  basis  of  credit,  that  the  process  of 
liquidation  was  severe,  and  that  of  recuperation  slow. 

But  whilst  the  closing  years  of  this  second  decade  of 
the  century  were  a  season  of  ti-ial,  the  people  of  the  ter- 
ritory, engrossed  though  they  must  have  been  with  their 
private  troubles,  yet  found  time  to  devote  to  political 
affairs,  and  to  securing  for  Missouri  the  position  to  which 
her  population  entitled  her.  By  an  act  approved  in 
April,  1816,  she  had  been  advanced  to  the  third  or 
highest  grade  of  territorial  government,  and  during  the 
session  of  the  legislature  which  met  in  November,  1818, 
and  whilst  the  first  mutterings  of  the  financial  storm 
which  soon  spread  over  the  whole  country  were  but 
faintly  heard  in  the  distance,  application  was  made  to 


138  MISSOURI. 

Congress  for  authority  to  frame  a  constitution  and  es- 
tablish a  state  government. 

A  bill  to  effect  this  purpose  was  at  once  introduced 
into  the  House,  and  in  February,  1819,  it  came  up  for 
consideration.  Mr.  Tallmadge,  of  New  York,  then  of- 
fered an  amendment,  making  it  a  condition  precedent  to 
admission  "  that  the  further  introduction  of  slavery  or 
involuntary  servitude  shall  be  prohibited,  except  for  the 
punishment  of  crimes,  whereof  the  party  shall  have  been 
fully  convicted  ;  and  that  all  children  born  within  the 
State  after  the  admission  thereof  shall  be  free  at  the  age 
of  twenty-five  years."  This  amendment,  in  so  far  as  it 
"  restricted  "  their  freedom  of  action,  was  exceedingly 
objectionable  to  the  people  of  Missouri,  and  it  also  gave 
rise  to  a  long  and  acrimonious  debate  in  Congress,  which 
convidsed  the  whole  country  and  threatened  the  stability 
of  the  Union  itself.  Ostensibly,  it  was  a  protest  in  the 
interest  of  morality  against  the  evil  of  slavery,  and  an 
effort  to  legislate  it  out  of  territory  where  it  lawfully 
existed  ;  but  in  reality  it  was,  as  Rufus  King  frankly 
admitted,  a  struggle  for  political  power,  and  it  did  not 
differ  from  that  which  had  taken  place  in  1803,  when  the 
treaty  for  the  purchase  of  Louisiana  was  under  consider- 
ation, except  in  being  aligned  upon  a  different  issue.  The 
admission  of  Alabama  in  1819  and  the  organization  of 
the  territory  of  Ai'kansas  in  the  year  following,  without 
any  restriction  as  to  slavery  and  whilst  the  Missouri 
question  was  still  pending,  to  say  nothing  of  the  addition 
to  Missouri  in  1836  of  the  Platte  Purchase,  —  a  territory 
larger  than  some  of  the  States,  —  indicate  very  clearly 
that  hostility  to  slavery  was  not  at  all  times  the  control- 
ling motive  of  all  of  those  who  sought  to  prevent  the 
increase  of  slave  States. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE   MISSOURI    COMPROIMISE. 

To  understand  the  condition  of  affairs  that  prevailed 
at  Washington  at  this  time,  it  is  necessary  to  bear  in 
mind  that  when  the  fifteenth  Congress  assembled,  in 
December,  1817,  the  free  States,  as  we  shall  call  them, 
had  acquired  a  large  and  constantly  increasing  prepon- 
derance in  the  House  of  Representatives,  whilst  in  the 
Senate,  with  its  representation  based  on  State^,  not  on 
population,  the  inequality  was  not  so  great ;  aiM^wiien 
Congress  met  in  this  year  there  were  in  the  Union  ten 
free  and  nine  slave  States,  counting  Delaware  among  the 
latter.  Early  in  the  session  Mississippi  was  admitted, 
and  in  December,  1818,  a  year  later,  Illinois,  a  free  State, 
was  brought  in,  thus  preserving  the  proportion  between 
the  two  sections  as  it  had  existed  at  the  time  of  the  adop- 
tion of  the  Constitution,  and  as  it  had  hitherto  been  main- 
tained. So  far  all  had  gone  well,  notwithstanding  the 
delay  that  attended  the  admission  of  Kentucky,  and  it  is 
possible  that  if  the  same  rate  of  increase  could  have  been 
kept  up  on  both  sides,  the  angry  controversy  which  took 
place  at  this  time  and  the  ill-feeling  which  it  engendered 
might  have  been  indefinitely  postponed.  Such,  however, 
was  not  the  case.  For  reasons  that  seem  to  be  inherent  in 
the  system  of  slavery  the  South  spread  territorially  more 
rapidly  than  the  North,  and  in  the  session  of  1818-19, 
—  the  second  of  this  Congress,  —  Alabama  and  Missouri, 


140  MISSOURI. 

two  slave  territories,  applied  for  authority  to  frame  con- 
stitutions, preparatory  to  their  admission  into  the  Union. 
This  of  course  precipitated  the  issue  as  to  the  balance  of 
power  ;  for,  obviously,  if  these  two  applicants  were  to  be 
brought  into  the  Union  with  slavery,  as  in  all  probability 
they  would  elect  to  be,  the  proportion  hitherto  existing 
between  the  free  and  slave  States  would  be  destroyed, 
and  the  preponderance  of  power  in  the  Senate  would  be 
handed  over  to  the  South.  This  the  representatives  from 
the  North  were  determined  to  prevent,  and  to  this  end  it 
was  necessary  either  to  defeat  the  admission  of  one  of 
these  territories,  or  to  bring  it  in  as  a  free  State. 

So  far  as  Alabama  was  concerned,  Georgia,  when 
ceding  the  territory  out  of  which  that  State  was  subse- 
quently carved,  had  made  certain  stipulations  in  regard 
to  slavery  which  were  regarded  as  deciding,  in  the 
affirmative,  the  question  of  the  existence  of  this  form 
of  labor  in  all  that  region.  At  all  events,  for  this  or 
some  other  equally  good  reason,  there  was  no  attempt 
made  at  Washington  to  dictate  a  constitution  to  the 
people  of  Alabama,  and  they  were  left  free  to  come  into 
the  Union  with  or  without  slavery,  as  to  them  might 
seem  best.  To  an  unprejudiced  mind,  this  appears  to 
have  been  a  just  and  fair  method  of  settling  the  matter, 
or  rather  of  letting  it  settle  itself  ;  and  as  it  had  worked 
well  in  the  case  of  Louisiana,  it  is  difficult  to  under- 
stand why  the  same  rule  should  not  have  been  applied 
to  Missouri,  save  on  the  theory  that  the  balance  of  power 
required  that  if  she  were  to  come  into  the  Union  at  this 
time,  it  must  be  as  a  free  State.  On  no  other  ground  can 
the  action  of  Congress  be  explained  and  justified.  The 
article  in  the  Louisiana  treaty  which  guaranteed  to  the 
people  of  that  territory  the  possession  of  their  property 


THE  MISSOURI  COMPROMISE.  141 

including  slaves,  was  certainly  as  sacred  as  was  the 
clause  in  the  Georgia  deed  of  cession  which  is  assumed 
to  have  legalized  slavery  in  Alabama.  So  far,  too,  as 
the  action  of  Congress  could  give  them  validity  these 
two  instruments  stood  upon  an  equal  footing ;  for  both 
had  been  reaffirmed,  the  one  by  the  admission  of  Louis- 
iana, and  the  other  by  that  of  Mississippi.  In  fact,  the 
two  cases  are  believed  to  be  strictly  analogous  and  were 
therefore  equally  binding.  If,  then.  Congress  had  the 
power  to  forbid  slavery  in  Missouri,  it  had  the  power  to 
l)rohibit  it  in  Alabama  ;  and  it  was  clearly  the  duty  of 
those  who  favored  the  Missouri  "  restriction,"  if  they 
believed  slavery  to  be  the  great  evil  which  they  said 
they  did,  to  have  insisted  upon  doing  so,  even  though 
it  involved  them  in  as  utter  disregard  for  the  Georgia 
deed  of  cession  as  they  subsequently  showed  for  the 
Louisiana  treaty.  Such,  however,  does  not  appear  to 
have  been  their  opinion,  for  in  December,  1819,  Alabama 
was  received  into  the  Union  with  slavery,  and  without 
any  serious  opposition  on  their  part,  at  the  very  time 
that  they  were  insisting  most  strenuously  upon  forcing 
the  people  of  Missouri  to  adopt  a  clause  in  their  con- 
stitution which  should  put  an  end  to  slavery,  under 
penalty  of  being  refused  admission  into  the  sisterhood 
of  States. 

Out  of  this  measure,  as  formulated  in  the  amendment 
of  Mr.  Tallmadge,  of  New  York,  sprung  up  a  debate,  in 
which,  for  the  first  time,  parties  were  divided  by  a  geo- 
graphical line,  and  in  which  hot  words  and  threats  were 
bandied  to  and  fro  with  a  frequency  and  freedom  that 
showed  how  deep  and  determined  was  the  feeling  that 
underlaid  the  struggle.  On  the  part  of  those  who  op- 
posed   the    imposition    of  this  "  restriction,"  as  it  was 


142  MISSOURI. 

called,  upon  the  people  of  Missouri,  it  was  contended 
that  the  measure  was  contrary  to  the  precedents  estab- 
lished by  Congress  in  the  cases  of  Kentucky,  Tennessee, 
Louisiana,  Mississippi,  and  Alabama,  all  of  which  had 
been  admitted  into  the  Union  with  slavery ;  that  it  in- 
fringed upon  that  article  in  the  treaty  of  purchase  which 
guaranteed  to  the  people  of  Louisiana  the  possession  of 
their  property ;  and  that  Congress  had  no  power  to 
prescribe  to  a  State  any  particular  form  of  government, 
other  than  that  it  should  be  republican  ;  and  that  even 
if  they  had  the  abstract  power,  it  would  be  folly  to  use 
it,  since  the  people  of  the  State  would  have  a  perfect 
right  to  change  or  amend  their  constitution  whenever, 
and  in  whatever  way,  they  might  think  proper. 

In  answer  to  these  arguments,  it  was  objected  that 
Congress  had  imposed  restrictions  upon  other  States,  as, 
for  instance,  in  the  case  of  Louisiana ;  that  in  the  bill 
now  under  consideration,  there  was  a  clause  which  for- 
bade Missouri  to  tax,  for  five  years,  the  lands  that  had 
been  granted  to  soldiers  ;  and  that  even  if  this  were  not 
so,  the  power  to  admit,  or  to  refuse  to  admit,  a  State, 
which  Congress  unquestionably  possessed,  necessarily 
carried  with  it  the  power  to  impose  the  conditions  upon 
which  such  State  should  be  admitted.  In  regard  to  the 
argument  based  upon  the  treaty  of  purchase  and  the  in- 
fringement wliich  this  amendment,  if  adopted,  would 
work  in  the  rights  of  property,  it  was  held  that  slavery 
existed  only  in  virtue  of  local  law ;  that  it  was  not  only 
unrepublican  in  its  nature,  but  it  was  also  a  moral  wrong 
as  well  as  a  political  and  economical  evil ;  and  hence,  no 
matter  if  the  treaty  and  the  subsequent  enactments  of 
Congress  did  sanction  it,  self-interest  and  a  higher  law 
demanded   that   it  should  be  abolished.     These  objec- 


THE  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.  143 

tions  were  urged  with  great  warmth  and  persistency, 
and  there  can  be  no  question  as  to  the  influence  they 
exerted  upon  the  people  of  the  North,  though  a  mo- 
ment's reflection  will  convince  any  fair-minded  person 
that  they  were  more  specious  than  solid.  If  the  effort 
to  extinguish  slavery  in  Missouri  had  been  in  conformity 
with  the  will  of  the  people  of  that  State,  and  in  undoubted 
accord  with  the  treaty  of  purchase  and  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,  tlie  position  of  those  who  favored 
the  "  restriction  "  would  have  been  absolutely  impreg- 
nable. But  this  was  not  the  case,  and  hence  the  anal- 
ogy which,  it  was  claimed,  existed  between  this  restric- 
tion and  those  which  had  been  imposed  on  other  States 
fell  to  the  gi'ound.  So,  also,  in  regard  to  the  wrong  and 
the  evil  of  slavery,  both  of  which,  we  may  remark  in 
passing,  were  admitted.  Indeed,  on  this  point  the  rep- 
resentatives from  the  South  went  quite  as  far  as  did 
their  neighbors  from  the  North  ;  and  it  is  probably  safe 
to  say  that,  as  an  original  proposition,  any  measure  that 
looked  to  the  introduction  of  slavery  into  territory  then 
free  would  have  found  but  few  defenders.  But  this 
was  not  tlie  point  at  issue,  and  its  discussion  was  there- 
fore irrelevant.  The  question  to  be  decided  was  whether 
Congress  had  the  right  to  abolish  slavery  in  a  region 
where  it  legally  existed,  regardless  of  treaty  stipulations 
and  of  the  wishes  of  the  people  most  directly  inter- 
ested. It  was,  it  will  be  seen,  a  matter  of  law,  not 
of  morality ;  and  in  justice  to  themselves  and  to  their 
friends  and  kindred  who  had  immigrated  to  Missouri, 
the  South  could  not  afford  to  surrender  the  point. 
Accordingly,  they  planted  themselves  upon  their  con- 
stitutional rights  and  the  faith  of  treaties,  and  though 
this  position  was  hotly  contested  at  the  time,  yet,  to-day, 


144  MISSOURI. 

there  are  probably  few  who  will  venture  to  question 
its  legality,  whatever  may  be  thought  of  its  morality. 
As  a  matter  of  law,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  Mis- 
souri was  entitled  to  admission  in  1820,  and  with  slav- 
ery, if  her  people  so  willed  it,  just  as  Louisiana  had 
been  in  1812,  and  as  Arkansas  was  in  1836 ;  and 
the  attempt  on  the  part  of  one  branch  of  Congress  to 
force  her  jieople  to  do  away  with  slavery  as  a  sine  qua 
non  of  admission  into  the  Union  was,  as  was  afterwards 
affirmed  by  the  supreme  court,  a  stretch  of  power  not 
warranted  by  the  Constitution,  and  therefore  illegal. 
Upon  this  point  the  argument  of  John  Quincy  Adams  is 
unanswerable.  Speaking,  some  years  later,  on  the  mo- 
tion to  admit  Arkansas,  he  said  :  "  She  is  entitled  to 
admission  as  a  slave  State  ...  by  virtue  of  that  article 
ill  the  treaty  for  the  acquisition  of  Louisiana  which  se- 
cures to  the  inhabitants  of  the  ceded  territories  all  the 
rights,  privileges,  and  immunities  of  the  original  citizens 
of  the  United  States  ;  and  stipulates  for  their  admission, 
conformably  to  that  principle,  into  the  Union.  Louisi- 
ana was  purchased  as  a  country  wherein  slavery  was 
the  established  law  of  the  land.  As  Congress  have  not 
power  in  time  of  peace  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  original 
States  of  the  Union,  they  are  equally  destitute  in  those 
parts  of  the  territory  ceded  by  France  to  the  United 
States  under  the  name  of  Louisiana,  where  slavery 
existed  at  the  time  of  the  acquisition.  .  ,  .  Arkansas," 
or  Missouri,  for  the  argument  applied  equally  to  her, 
"  therefore,  comes,  and  has  the  right  to  come,  into  the 
Union  with  her  slaves  and  her  slave  laws.  It  is  writ- 
ten in  the  bond,  and  however  I  may  lament  that  it  was 
so  written,  I  must  faithfully  perform  its  obligations."  ^ 
Benton's  Abridgment  of  the  Debates,  vol.  xiii.  p.  33. 


THE  MISSOURI  COMPROMISE.  145 

In  spite  of  the  strength  of  this  position  and  the  doubts 
that  must  have  prevailed  as  to  the  validity  of  a  con- 
trary course,  the  opponents  of  the  "  restriction "  were 
outvoted,  and  the  amendment  of  Mr.  Talhnadge,  abol- 
ishing slavery  in  Missouri  (for  that  was  what  it  amounted 
to),  was  carried.  When  the  measure  came  before  the 
Senate,  this  feature  was  stricken  out  by  a  decided  vote, 
and  the  bill  was  returned  to  the  House  in  the  shape  in 
which  it  had  been  originally  introduced.  This  body 
refused  to  concur  in  the  change,  and  as  the  Senate  ad- 
hered to  its  position,  the  fifteenth  Congress  adjourned 
without  coming  to  any  agreement,  and  the  bill  was 
lost. 

With  the  opening  of  the  new  Congress,  in  December, 
1819,  the  question  again  came  up,  but  under  somewhat 
different  auspices.  The  House,  it  is  true,  showed  very 
jjlainly  that  it  was  not  prepared  to  abandon  the  position 
it  had  taken  in  favor  of  abolishing  slavery  in  Missouri ; 
but  the  ajiplication  of  Maine  for  admission  into  the 
Union,  which  was  made  about  this  time,  enabled  the 
Senate  to  exercise  a  little  gentle  pressure  upon  their 
neighbors  of  the  lower  house  by  a  resort  to  the  well- 
known  device  of  coupling  the  two  measures  into  one  and 
the  same  bill.  This  was  done,  and  with  a  candor  that 
was  worthy  of  a  better  cause,  the  opponents  of  the  Mis- 
souri restriction  in  both  houses  of  Congress  declared  that 
the  two  measures  must  stand  or  fall  together ;  that  un- 
less Missouri  was  admitted  into  the  Union  and  without 
conditions  as  to  slavery,  Maine  should  be  kept  out.  This 
brought  on  a  debate,  which  ran  through  several  weeks, 
and  finally  culminated  in  a  dead-lock,  the  appointment 
of  a  committee  of  conference,  and  the  adoption  of  a 
measure,  or  rather  a  series  of  measures,  known  as  the 


146  MISSOURI. 

Missouri  Compromise.  By  the  terms  of  this  agreement, 
which,  it  may  be  well  to  observe,  was  vinderstood  and  not 
expressed,  the  clause  prohibiting  slavery  was  stricken 
from  the  bill  authorizing  the  people  of  Missouri  to  form 
a  constitution.  This  left  them  nominally  free  to  or- 
ganize the  State  with  or  without  slavery,  as  they  might 
prefer,  but  without  any  express  guarantee  as  to  its  ad- 
mission into  the  Union,  though  it  seems  to  have  been 
clearly  understood  that  this  was  to  be  the  effect  of  the 
measure.  In  return  for  this  concession,  which,  in  the 
light  of  a  subsequent  decision  of  the  supreme  court, 
yielded  nothing,  Maine  was  brought  into  the  Union,  and 
a  provision  was  inserted  into  the  Missouri  bill,  by  which 
it  was  stipulated  that  slavery  should  be  excluded  from 
all  "  the  territory  ceded  by  France  to  the  United  States, 
under  the  name  of  Louisiana,  north  of  thirty-six  degrees 
and  thirty  minutes  north  latitude." 

In  securing  the  adoption  of  this  compromise,  if  that 
term  can  be  truly  applied  to  a  transaction  in  which  one 
party  gained  everything  and  conceded  nothing,  the  rep- 
resentatives of  the  free  and  relatively  populous  North 
achieved  a  decided  success.  For  the  first  time  in  the 
histoxy  of  the  country,  they  had  openly  attempted  to 
limit  the  power  of  the  South  by  preventing  the  admis- 
sion of  a  slave  State,  and  they  certainly  had  no  cause  to 
be  dissatisfied  with  the  result  of  the  experiment.  By 
the  admission  of  Maine,  they  had  regained  the  suprem- 
acy in  the  Senate  which  was  temporarily  lost  when 
Alabama  came  into  the  Union ;  and  if  they  had  not  suc- 
ceeded in  carrying  a  measure  for  the  abolition  of  slavery 
in  Missouri,  they  had  secured  the  passage  of  a  law  by 
which  all  that  vast  domain  situated  north  of  the  line  of 
thirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  minutes  north  latitude,  and 


THE  MISSOURI   COMPROMISE.  147 

lying  between  the  Eocky  Mountains  and  the  Mississippi 
River,  was  transformeil,  as  far  as  an  act  of  Congress 
could  effect  that  purj)ose,  from  possible  slave  to  actual 
free  territory. 

Like  all  arrangements  that  are  based  upon  expedi- 
ency alone,  this  agreement  was  not  lasting.  Subse- 
quent Congresses  did  not  hesitate  to  violate  it  whenever 
it  suited  their  purposes  to  do  so  ;  and  individual  States, 
even  those  that  had  most  to  gain  by  insisting  upon  its 
observance,  indicated  clearly  what  they  thought  of  its 
character  when  they  declared,  as  Massachusetts  did  in 
1845.  that  they  did  not  intend  to  abide  by  it.  In  fact, 
neither  of  the  great  political  parties  ever  regarded  it  as 
being  peculiarly  sacred  save  when  there  was  something 
to  be  gained  by  so  doing.  As  early  as  1836  it  was  vio- 
lated, and  that  without  a  protest  on  the  part  of  the  North, 
by  the  addition  to  the  State  of  Missouri  of  the  triangle 
knoAvni  as  the  Platte  purchase  ;  in  1854  it  was  formally 
abrogated ;  and  in  1857  it  was  pronounced  unconstitu- 
tional in  an  obiter  dictum  opinion  of  the  highest  tribunal 
in  the  land. 

This  was  certainly  a  most  lame  and  impotent  conclu- 
sion, but  for  this  verdict  the  Southern  men  who  had 
sanctioned  the  compromise  were  not  responsible.  In 
good  faith,  and  in  the  interest  of  j^eace  and  the  Union, 
they  had  sacrificed  what  they  believed  to  be,  and  what 
have  since  been  decided  to  have  been,  their  constitutional 
rights  ;  and.  so  far  as  they  could,  they  had  dedicated  to 
freedom  a  much  larger  extent  of  country  than  that  which 
their  fathers  had  given,  when  in  1787,  by  a  vote  of  five 
slave  and  three  free  States,  they  had  passed  the  famous 
ordinance  that  made  free  all  the  region  north  of  the 
Ohio  and  south  of  the  Lakes.     In  so  doing  they  certainly 


148  MISSOURI. 

had  not  been  guilty  of  any  act  of  aggression,  whatever 
else  it  may  have  been ;  and  the  fact  that  a  majority  of 
them  in  each  house,  small  though  it  was,  were  willing 
to  make  the  concession  is  proof  not  only  of  their  devo- 
tion to  the  Union,  but  it  indicates  very  clearly  what  are 
believed  to-  have  been  their  sentiments,  at  this  time,  in 
regard  to  the  extension  of  slavery. 

Were  other  evidence  on  this  point  necessary,  it  may 
be  found  in  the  ratification  by  the  Senate,  at  this  very 
session  of  Congress,  of  the  treaty  with  Spain,  in  virtue 
of  which  all  of  Louisiana  territory  south  of  the  line  of 
thirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  minutes,  except  Arkansas 
and  a  strip  reserved  for  certain  Indian  tribes,  was  ex- 
changed for  the  Floridas.  Of  the  merits  of  this  treaty, 
or  of  the  hidden  motives  that  may  have  led  the  Southern 
members  to  vote  for  its  ratification,  it  is  not  my  province 
to  speak.  All  that  it  concerns  us  to  know  is  the  fact 
that,  in  relinquishing  their  claims  to  all  this  region,  the 
United  States  sold  the  only  territory  they  owned  west 
of  the  Mississippi,  excejjt  Arkansas,  into  which  slavery 
could  be  legally  carried.  Indeed,  if  we  also  excejjt  Flor- 
ida, which  was  acquu'ed  by  the  treaty,  there  was  not 
then  a  foot  of  land  on  either  side  of  the  Mississippi,  be- 
longing to  the  United  States,  in  which  slavery  had  not 
been  extinguished,  and  that  with  the  approval  and  by 
the  votes  of  Southern  slaveholders. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE   ADMISSION    OF   MISSOURI   INTO   THE   UNION". 

Although  the  adoption  of  this  compromise  put  an 
end  to  the  attempt  on  the  part  of  the  North  to  abolish 
slavery  in  Missouri,  it  did  not  secure  her  admission  into 
the  Union,  neither  was  it  the  work  of  Henry  Clay.  The 
honor  of  having  suggested  it  as  a  means  of  escape  from 
a  dead-lock  which  threatened  the  integrity  of  the  Union 
belongs  to  Jesse  B.  Thomas,  a  senator  from  Illinois,  and 
a  Southern  man  by  birth,  though  it  is  proper  to  add 
that  Mr.  Clay  lent  to  the  measure  the  weight  of  his 
great  name  and  abilities,  and  that  it  probably  could  not 
have  been  carried  without  his  assistance.  What  he 
really  brought  about,  and  what  earned  for  him  the  title 
of  the  peace-maker,  was  the  adoption  of  a  second  com- 
promise, by  virtue  of  which  Missouri  was  admitted  into 
the  Union,  not  in  the  usual  way,  but  through  a  sort  of 
side  door,  opened  to  her  in  return  for  a  certain  conces- 
sion which  she  was  assumed  to  have  made. 

As  a  compromise,  using  this  term  in  its  usual  accepta- 
tion, this  second  measure  was  as  one-sided  as  the  first, 
but  differed  from  that  in  being  altogether  in  the  interest 
of  the  South.  By  it,  a  few  Northern  men  (fourteen  in 
the  House,  and  eight  in  the  Senate),  joined  to  an  almost 
solid  Southern  vote,  were  able  to  secure  the  admission 
of  Missouri,  on  the  condition  that  her  legislature  should 
adopt  a  "  solemn  public  act,"  which  was   ostensibly   a 


150  MISSOURI. 

modification,  or  rather  a  repeal,  of  an  article  in  the  con- 
stitution she  had  just  adopted,  and  which,  therefore,  from 
its  nature,  was  of  no  binding  force,  moral  or  legal,  upon 
any  human  being  whatsoever. 

To  understand  this  curious  page  of  legislative  history, 
it  is  necessary  to  transfer  the  field  of  investigation  from 
Washington  to  Missouri,  and  note  briefly  the  change 
which  the  adoption  of  the  first,  or  Missouri  Compro- 
mise proper,  had  wrought  in  the  political  condition  of 
the  people  of  the  territory. 

For  a  few  years  previous  to  this  time,  ever  since  1816, 
they  had  been  living  under  the  third  or  highest  form  of 
territorial  government,  but  when  the  news  of  the  passage 
of  this  "  act "  reached  them,  they  at  once  took  steps  to 
organize  the  State.  An  election  was  held  for  members 
of  a  convention  which  met  in  June,  1820,  and  proceeded 
to  frame  a  constitution.  It  was  a  fairly  representative 
body,  and  numbered  among  its  members  some  who  were 
afterwards  called  upon  to  play  conspicuous  parts  upon  a 
more  extended  theatre.  As  might  have  been  expected, 
it  was  composed  altogether  of  men  who  were  in  favor 
of  making  Missouri  a  slave  State,  though  they  were  not 
necessarily  in  favor  of  a  still  further  extension  of  the 
slave  area ;  and  it  is  a  curious  commentary  upon  the 
changes  that  subsequently  took  place  in  men  and  meas- 
ures that  Edward  Bates,  who  was  attorney-general  un- 
der President  Lincoln,  and  one  of  the  best  and  purest 
men  this  country  has  produced,  was  one  of  its  members, 
having  been  returned  from  St.  Louis  in  the  pro-slavery 
interest.  The  fact  is  that  the  attempt  of  the  Northern 
representatives  to  regulate  the  domestic  affairs  of  the 
territory  had  reacted  upon  themselves,  and  instead  of 
strengthening  the  hands  of  their  friends,  it  had  alienated 


ADMISSION  INTO   THE    UNION.  151 

not  a  few,  even  of  those  who  agreed  with  tliem  upon  the 
question  of  slavery.  It  was  looked  upon  as  a  high- 
handed effort  at  usui-pation,  and  such  was  the  opposition 
it  provoked  within  the  State  that,  owing  to  this  and  to 
other  causes  that  will  readily  suggest  themselves,  no  one 
whose  views  upon  the  slavery  question  were  in  the  least 
doubtful  stood  any  chance  of  an  election.  Even  among  the 
free-state  men  the  issue  had  become  so  complicated  that 
the  "  Missouri  Gazette,"  whose  editor,  Joseph  Charless, 
was  one  of  the  leaders  on  that  side,  declared,  on  one  oc- 
casion, when  speaking  of  the  effort  in  Congress  to  abol- 
ish slavery  in  the  incoming  State,  that  "  the  question 
was  not  whether  slavery  shall  or  shall  not  be  prohibited, 
.  •  .  but  whether  we  shall  meanly  abandon  our  rights 
and  suffer  any  earthly  power  to  dictate  the  terms  of  our 
constitution." 

After  a  session  of  a  little  over  a  month,  and  an  ex- 
penditure for  stationery,  etc.,  of  a  total  of  twenty-six 
dollars  and  twenty-five  cents,  the  convention  adjourned, 
having  comjileted  the  work  for  which  it  had  been  called 
together.  The  constitution,  as  adopted,  was  not  sub- 
mitted to  a  vote  of  the  people  for  ratification,  but  took 
effect  of  its  own  motion.  It  did  away  with  the  territo- 
rial government,  and  provided  for  the  election  of  officers, 
state  as  well  as  national.  In  August  of  that  year  this 
election  was  held,  and  the  officers  then  chosen  were  duly 
inaugurated  ;  and  although  it  was  a  year  and  more  be- 
fore Missouri  was  finally  admitted  into  the  Union,  yet 
the  wheels  of  her  government  were  promptly  set  in  mo- 
tion, and  she  found  herself  occupying  the  somewhat 
anomalous  position  of  a  State  outside  of  the  Union. 

Of  course  this  constitution  sanctioned  slavery.  That 
was  a  foregone  conclusion  :  but  as  it  was  the  very  con- 


152  MISSOURI. 

tingency  against  which  the  compromise  that  had  been 
so  recently  adopted  was  intended  to  provide,  it  did  not 
furnish  any  just  and  tenable  ground  for  opposing  the 
admission  of  the  State.  So  far  as  the  Southern  rep- 
resentatives were  concerned,  they  had  complied  with 
their  part  of  the  agreement.  Maine  had  been  received 
into  the  Union  ;  slavery  had  been  excluded  from  all  the 
rest  of  Louisiana,  or  Missouri  territory  as  it  was  then 
called,  north  of  tliirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  minutes,  so 
far  as  an  act  of  Congress  could  effect  that  purpose  ;  and 
it  now  only  remained  formally  to  advance  Missouri  to 
the  dignity  of  a  State,  in  order  to  carry  out  in  full  the 
well-understood  terms  of  the  compromise.  This  a  large 
majority  of  the  Northern  representatives  were  unwilling 
to  permit,  so  long  as  her  constitution  sanctioned  slavery. 
They  had  voted  steadily  and  up  to  the  very  last  to  make 
IVIissouri  a  free  State,  regardless  of  the  wishes  of  her 
people ;  and  for  them  now  to  wheel  around  and  consent 
to  receive  her  into  the  Union  with  slavery  would  have 
indicated  a  change  of  heart  too  sudden  to  be  genuine, 
and  one  which,  in  the  temper  then  prevailing  at  the 
North,  they  might  have  found  it  difficult  to  explain  and 
defend.  Besides,  although  they  had  been  temporarily 
defeated  upon  the  question  of  prohibiting  slavery  in  the 
State,  yet  the  contest  had  been  close,  and  there  were 
not  a  few  among  them  who  did  not  despair  of  ultimate 
success,  though  they  seem  to  have  recognized  the  pro- 
priety of  shaping  their  course  so  as  to  avoid,  if  possible, 
the  appearance  of  coming  to  an  open  conflict  with  the 
recently  adopted  compromise.  Accordingly,  when  the 
constitution  which  the  State  of  Missouri  had  adopted 
was  presented  for  approval,  they  seized  upon  the  clause 
rendering  it  obligatory  upon  the  legislature  to  enact  a 


ADMISSION  INTO   THE    UNION.  153 

law  to  •'  prevent  free  negroes  and  mulattoes  from  com- 
ing to  and  settling  within  the  State,"  and  made  it  the 
occasion  for  renewing  the  struggle.  Free  negToes,  they 
contended,  were  recognized  as  citizens  in  some  of  the 
old  States,  and  as  emigration  was  a  privilege  possessed 
by  all  citizens,  they  insisted  upon  the  rejection  of  Mis- 
souri's application,  on  the  ground  that  this  article  was 
contrary  to  that  provision  of  the  federal  Constitution 
which  guaranteed  to  "■  the  citizens  of  each  State  the  priv- 
ileges and  immunities  of  citizens  in  the  several  States," 

That  this  was  a  mere  pretext,  intended  to  cover  up 
the  real  grounds  of  their  opposition,  hardly  admits  of  a 
douht.  The  fact  that,  at  tliis  time,  there  was,  probably, 
not  a  single  State,  north  or  south,  that  did  not  in  some 
shape  discriminate  against  blacks  and  in  favor  of  whites 
certainly  indicates  it ;  and  if  further  proof  be  required, 
it  will  be  found  in  the  chance  utterances  of  different 
speakers  during  the  course  of  the  debate,  in  the  proceed- 
ings of  the  legislature  of  at  least  one  of  the  Northern 
States,  and  in  the  fact  that  if  the  objectionable  article 
came  in  conflict  with  the  federal  Constitution,  as  it 
was  said  to  do,  it  was,  ijjso  facto,  null  and  void,  and 
would  be  so  decided  by  the  supreme  court,  whenever  the 
matter  came  up  for  adjudication.  However,  be  this  as 
it  may,  it  served  the  purpose  for  which  it  was  intended ; 
and  whether  the  objection  to  which  it  gave  rise  was 
feigned  or  real,  it  furnished  the  opponents  to  the  admis- 
sion of  Missom'i  with  what  they  most  needed,  —  a  plau- 
sible excuse  for  keeping  her  out  of  the  Union  without  an 
open  violation  of  their  part  of  the  compromise.  To  all 
outward  appearance,  they  now  opposed  her  admission, 
not  because  she  had  legalized  slavery,  but  because  she 
proposed  to  do  as  some  of  her  neighbors  had  already 


154  MISSOURI. 

done,  and  as  one  of  them  did  as  late  as  1846,  — prevent 
an  undesirable  class  of  persons  from  settling  within  her 
borders.  In  urging  this  objection  they  were  apparently 
occupying  high  constitutional  grounds,  but  in  reality 
their  opposition  was  simply  a  continuation  of  the  struggle 
which  had  been  begun  some  two  years  before  ;  and  dis- 
guise the  fact  as  we  may  under  high-sounding  phrases 
and  nice  verbal  distinctions,  it  was,  after  all,  but  another 
attempt  on  the  part  of  the  North  to  prevent  the  increase 
and  limit  the  power  of  the  South.  That  it  was  a  move- 
ment in  the  interest  of  morality  and  a  higher  civiliza- 
tion may  be  admitted,  but  that  will  not  alter  the  fact. 
The  path  was  different,  though  the  end  aimed  at  was  the 
same. 

In  the  debate  which  gi-ew  out  of  this  question  some  of 
the  ablest  men  in  the  nation  took  part.  The  evils  of 
slavery,  the  value  of  the  Union,  the  terms  of  the  Louisi- 
ana treaty,  the  true  intent  and  meaning  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise,  and  the  powers  of  Congress  in  the  premises 
were  all  discussed  at  length,  but  to  no  purpose.  The 
key  to  the  debate  lay  in  the  interpretation  that  was  to  be 
put  upon  that  clause  in  the  federal  Constitution,  according 
to  which  "  the  citizens  of  each  State  shall  be  entitled  to 
the  privileges  and  immunities  of  citizens  of  the  several 
States,"  and  upon  this  point  opinions  were  hopelessly 
divided.  Even  Charles  Pinckney's  declaration  that  when 
he  drew  up  this  clause  "  there  was  not  such  a  thing  in 
the  Union  as  a  black  or  colored  citizen,"  and  that  con- 
sequently it  could  not  have  been  intended  to  include  that 
class  of  persons,  important  as  it  was  to  a  proper  under- 
standing of  the  provision,  seems  to  have  had  little  or  no 
weight  in  bringing  about  a  decision.  Under  the  circum- 
stances, and  from  a  political  point  of  view,  it  was  more 


ADMISSION  INTO  THE  UNION:  155 

important  to  interpret  the  Constitution  so  as  to  make  it 
fit  the  changed  condition  of  affairs  than  to  find  out  what 
the  framers  of  that  instrument  had  intended  to  say. 
Accordingly,  when  it  was  urged  that  free  blacks  were 
not  citizens  in  the  sense  of  the  Constitution,  it  was  re- 
plied that  now  they  were  citizens  in  some  of  the  States, 
and  that  the  Constitution  spoke  of  citizens  of  the  "  sev- 
eral States,"  and  not  of  citizens  of  the  United  States.  In 
answer  to  this,  it  was  shown  that  if  this  interpretation 
prevailed,  it  would  be  possible  for  one  State  to  impose 
citizens  ujion  another  ;  and  that  it  might  be  made  to 
grant  to  a  free  colored  citizen,  say  of  Massachusetts, 
immigrating  to  Missouri,  rights  and  privileges  in  the  latter 
State  which  he  did  not  possess  in  the  former,  both  of 
which  propositions  were  declared  to  be  absurd.  In  this 
way  the  debate  ran  on  from  day  to  day  and  week  to 
week,  only  to  end  at  last  in  a  disagreement,  the  Senate 
being  in  favor  of  the  admission,  whilst  the  House  was 
opposed  to  it. 

In  this  condition  of  affairs  Mr.  Clay  found  his  oppor- 
tunity ;  and  he  introduced  a  resolution  to  appoint  a  joint 
committee,  "  to  consider  and  report  to  the  Senate  and 
House  respectively  whether  it  be  expedient  or  not  to 
make  provision  for  the  admission  of  Missouri  into  the 
Union  on  the  same  footing  as  the  original  States,  .  .  . 
and  if  not,  whether  any  other,  and  what  provision, 
adapted  to  her  actual  condition,  ought  to  be  made  by 
law."  This  resolution  was  carried  by  an  overwhelming 
vote  in  both  branches  of  Congress  ;  and  a  committee,  of 
which  Mr.  Clay  was  chairman,  and  which,  so  far  as  the 
House  was  concerned,  he  may  be  said  to  have  named, 
was  appointed.  In  due  time  it  reported  a  resolution  ad- 
mitting the  State,  provided  its  legislature  "  by  a  solemn 


156  MISSOURI. 

public  act  "  shall  declare  that  the  clause  in  the  constitu- 
tion relating  to  the  immigration  of  free  negroes  into  the 
State  shall  never  be  construed  to  authorize  the  passage 
of  any  law,  by  which  "  any  citizen  of  either  of  the  States 
in  this  Union  shall  be  excluded  from  the  enjoyment  of 
any  of  the  privileges  and  immunities  "  to  which  he  is  en- 
titled under  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  It 
was  also  provided,  and  the  reason  for  it  is  obvious, 
"  that  when  this  declaration  shall  have  been  made,  and 
a  copy  of  it  furnished  to  the  President,  he  shall,  by  proc- 
lamation, declare  the  State  to  be  admitted."  This  reso- 
lution was  passed  without  discussion,  having  been  carried 
in  the  Senate  by  a  vote  of  28  to  14,  and  in  the  House, 
where  the  contest  was  close,  by  86  to  82,  fourteen  mem- 
bers from  the  non-slaveholding  States  voting  in  the  affir- 
mative, whilst  a  few  Southerners  are  to  be  found  on  the 
other  side. 

With  the  adoption  of  this  measure  the  Missouri  ques- 
tion passed  out  of  the  hands  of  Congress,  and  it  now  only 
remained  for  the  legislature  of  that  State  to  go  through 
with  the  farce  of  pretending  to  set  aside  a  constitutional 
provision.  This  they  did  with  commendable  alacrity, 
though  they  evidently  were  well  aware  of  the  extent  of 
their  own  powers,  and  had  a  keen  sense  of  the  absurdity 
of  the  part  they  were  called  upon  to  play.  After  recit- 
ing the  act  of  Congress  containing  the  condition  under 
which  Missouri  was  to  be  received  into  the  Union,  they 
went  on  to  declare  that,  "  forasmuch  as  the  good  people 
of  this  State  have,  by  the  most  solemn  and  public  act  in 
their  power,  virtually  assented  to  the  said  fundamental 
condition,  when,  by  their  representatives  in  full  and  free 
convention  assembled,  they  adopted  the  constitution  of 
this  State,  and  consented    to   be  incorporated  into    the 


ADMISSION  INTO  TEE  UNION.  157 

federal  Union,  and  governed  by  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  which  among  other  things  provides  that 
the  said  Constitution  and  laws  of  the  United  States,  made 
in  pursuance  thereof,  and  all  treaties  made  or  which 
shall  be  made  under  the  authority  of  the  United  States, 
shall  be  the  supreme  law  of  the  land  ;  and  the  judges  in 
every  State  shall  be  bound  thereby,  anything  in  the  con- 
stitution or  law  of  any  State  to  the  contrary  notwith- 
standing. And  although  this  general  assembly  do  most 
solemnly  declare  that  the  Congress  of  the  United  States 
have  no  constitutional  power  to  annex  any  condition  to 
the  admission  of  this  State  into  the  federal  Union,  and 
that  this  general  assembly  have  no  power  to  change  the 
operation  of  the  constitution  of  this  State,  except  in  the 
mode  prescribed  in  the  Constitution  itself,  nevertheless, 
as  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  has  desired  tliis 
general  assembly  to  declare  the  assent  of  this  State 
to  said  fundamental  condition,  and  forasmuch  as  such 
declaration  will  neither  restrain  nor  enlarge,  limit  nor 
extend,  the  operation  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States  or  of  this  State  ;  but  the  said  constitutions  will 
remain  in  all  respects  as  if  the  said  resolution  had  never 
passed,  and  the  desired  declaration  was  never  made  ; 
and  hecause  such  declaration  wiU  not  divest  any  power 
or  change  the  duties  of  any  of  the  constitutional  authori- 
ties of  this  State  or  of  the  United  States,  nor  inijiair  the 
rights  of  the  people  of  this  State,  or  impose  any  additional 
obligation  upon  them,  but  may  promote  an  earlier  en- 
joyment of  their  vested  federal  rights,  and  this  State  be- 
ing, moreover,  determined  to  give  to  her  sister  States  and 
to  the  world  the  most  unequivocal  proof  of  her  desire  to 
promote  the  peace  and  hax'mony  of  the  Union  —  there- 
fore 


158  MISSOURI. 

"  Be  it  enacted  and  declared  by  the  General  Assembly 
of  the  State  of  Missouri,  and  it  is  hereby  solemnly  and 
publicly  enacted  and  declared,  That  this  State  has  as- 
sented and  does  assent  that  the  fourth  clause  of  the 
twenty-sixth  section  of  the  third  article  of  the  constitu- 
tion of  this  State  shall  never  be  construed  to  authorize 
the  passage  of  any  law,  and  that  no  law  shall  he  passed 
in  conformity  thereto,  by  which  any  citizen,  of  either  of 
the  United  States,  shall  be  excluded  from  the  enjoyment 
of  any  of  the  privileges  and  immunities  to  which  such 
citizens  are  entitled  under  the  Constitution  of  the  United 
States." 

Upon  the  receipt  of  a  certified  copy  of  this  act,  which, 
considered  with  reference  to  the  preamble  which  accom- 
panied it,  can  hardl}'  be  called  solemn.  President  Mon- 
roe issued  a  proclamation  announcing  the  fact  of  its  pas- 
sage, and  declaring  that  the  admission  of  Missouri  was 
complete.  This  proclamation  bears  date  the  10th  of 
August,  1821,  and  consequently  that  is  the.  day  upon 
which  Missouri  took  her  place  in  the  sisterhood  of 
States,  and  upon  which  the  long  and  bitter  controversy 
of  which  she  had  bepn  the  innocent  occasion  was  brought 
to  an  end. 

In  looking  back  over  this  exciting  period  and  noting 
the  results  that  were  obtained,  we  cannot  but  be  struck 
with  the  absurdity,  inconsistency,  and,  in  view  of  subse- 
quent decisions,  we  may  add  the  illegality,  that  character- 
ized almost  every  phase  of  the  proceedings  of  Congress 
upon  this  question.  Thus,  for  instance,  we  find  that  be- 
fore admitting  Missouri  into  the  Union  "  upon  an  equal 
footing  with  the  other  States,"  an  effort  was  made  to  de- 
prive her  of  the  privilege  which  her  sister  States  had 
exercised,  and  which  they  still  possessed,  of  deciding  for 


ADMISSION  INTO  THE  UNION.  159 

herself  whether  she  woukl  or  would  not  legalize  slavery, 
unmindful  apjjarently  of  the  fact  that  if  the  measure  had 
been  carried  and  could  have  been  enforced,  it  would  have 
established  her  inequality  at  the  very  outset  of  her  career. 
This  was,  to  say  the  least,  somewhat  inconsistent ;  and 
what  added  to  the  absurdity  of  the  situation  was  the  fact 
that,  although  the  attempt  on  the  part  of  a  majority  of 
the  representatives  from  the  North  to  prohibit  slavery 
in  Missouri  was,  as  was  afterwards  decided,  unconstitu- 
tional, yet  by  way  of  inducing  them  to  abandon  their 
opposition  upon  this  point  and  consent  to  the  admission 
of  the  State  with  or  without  slavery,  as  her  people  might 
decide,  the  South  agreed  to  a  condition,  which  was  also 
subsequently  decided  to  be  unconstitutional,  by  virtue  of 
which  slavery  was  excluded  from  all  the  territory  north 
of  thirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  minutes  north  latitude. 
Thus  we  have  the  singular  spectacle  of  a  great  political 
party  agreeing  to  refi'ain  from  an  act  which  would  have 
been  a  violation  of  the  organic  law  of  the  land,  and  which 
they  therefore  could  not  legally  perform  ;  in  return  for 
which  their  opponents  agree  to  a  measure,  and  actually 
embody  it  into  a  law,  which  was  also  null  and  void,  be- 
cause it,  too,  was  in  opposition  to  this  same  Constitu- 
tion. This,  it  will  be  observed,  was  compromise  number 
one,  the  far-famed  Missouri  Compromise  of  March  6, 
1820 ;  or  rather  it  is  all  that  was  left  of  it  after  passing 
through  the  hands  of  the  supreme  court  in  1857.  In 
view  of  this  decision  it  seems  like  waste  of  time  to  repeat 
that  Missouri  was  not  admitted  into  the  Union  under 
this  agreement,  but  that  she  was  brought  in  under  an- 
other and  a  totally  different  one,  entered  into  March  2, 
1821 ;  and  hence  that,  in  the  opinion  of  not  a  few,  even 
of  those  who  had  aided  in  passing  it,  the  first,  or  Mis- 


160  MISSOURI. 

souri  Compromise,  was  violated  within  the  year  by  the 
very  Congress  that  adopted  it,  and  the  agreement  as  to 
the  exchision  of  slavery  north  o£  the  line  of  thirty-six  de- 
grees and  thirty  minutes  thus  became  void  and  of  no  ef- 
fect, the  consideration  for  it  having  failed.  Unsatisfac- 
tory as  this  attempt  at  compromise  proved  to  be,  it  did 
not  by  any  means  complete  the  chapter  of  errors  and 
inconsistencies  that  marked  the  proceedings  of  Congress 
in  all  their  dealings  with  this  question.  Indeed,  so  cu- 
rious was  the  next  stejj  taken  that  it  is  impossible  to  un- 
derstand it,  save  on  the  theory  suggested  by  Benton,  that 
the  Democrats,  or  Republicans  as  they  were  then  called, 
of  the  North  had  become  sensible  of  the  error  into 
which,  when  judged  from  a  party  point  of  view,  they 
had  been  led  by  keeping  Missouri  out  of  the  Union,  and 
were  now  anxious  to  regain  their  lost  ground  and  bring 
her  in,  provided  it  could  be  done  without  jeopardizing 
their  individual  positions  at  home.  Certainly  nothing 
but  a  supposed  dire  political  necessity  could  account  for 
such  action  as  that  which  resulted  in  the  adoption  of 
what,  for  the  want  of  a  better  term,  may  be  styled  com- 
promise number  two.  By  it  Missouri  was,  as  we  have 
seen,  admitted  into  the  Union,  but  on  condition  that  her 
legislature  adopted  a  "  solemn  public  act,"  which  not 
only  came  in  conflict  with  a  provision  of  her  organic  law, 
and  was  therefore  null  and  void,  but  which,  if  it  meant 
anything  and  had  been  legal  and  could  have  been  carried 
out,  would  have  resulted  in  bringing  her  in,  not  on  an 
equality  with  the  other  States,  but  shorn  of  the  privi- 
lege which  they  had  enjoyed,  and  which  Illinois  exer- 
cised as  late  as  1846,  of  deciding  for  herself  as  to  the 
qualifications  of  those  who  were  to  live  within  her  bor- 
ders, thus  relegating  lier  at  once  to  a  position  of  marked 
inferiority. 


ADMISSION  INTO  THE  UNION.  161 

In  other  words,  to  protect  a  handful  of  so-called  citi- 
zens in  one  or  two  of  the  older  States,  not  one  of  whom 
would  ever  have  thought  of  immigrating  to  Missouri,  her 
legislature  was  required,  as  a  condition  precedent  to  her 
admission,  to  assent  to  a  measure  that  was  illegal  in  it- 
self, and  could  not,  therefore,  in  any  possible  way  affect 
the  class  of  persons  which  it  was  ostensibly  intended  to 
benefit. 

When  this  assent  was  given,  although  the  legislature 
that  gave  it  took  especial  pains  to  declare  that  their 
action  was  of  no  legal  force,  yet  the  demands  of  Congress 
were  satisfied  ;  and  President  Monroe,  at  the  head  of 
whose  cabinet  was  that  sterling  patriot  and  statesman, 
John  Quincy  Adams,  issued  a  proclamation  announcing 
the  fact,  and  declaring  that  the  admission  of  Missouri 
was  complete. 

Amid  all  this  confusion  and  conflict  of  ends  and 
means,  laws  and  constitutions,  and  we  have  by  no  means 
exhausted  the  list,  the  resolution  admitting  Maine  and 
the  proclamation  by  which  Missouri  was  brought  into 
the  Union  are  about  the  only  measures  that  stand  out 
distinctly  and  without  challenge.  They  were  final ;  and 
it  is  probable  that  they  would  both  have  been  passed 
without  serious  opposition,  if  Maine  had  been  ready  to 
take  her  place  in  the  Union  when  Missouri  made  appli- 
cation for  permission  to  frame  her  constitution.  Unfor- 
tunately, this  was  not  the  case ;  and  it  was  tliis  fact, 
which,  threatening  as  it  did  to  disturb  the  proportion 
that  had  hitherto  existed  between  the  free  and  slave 
States,  gave  the  Federalists  of  the  North  the  opportunity 
of  bringing  the  slavery  question  to  the  front  as  a  polit- 
ical issue.  Intended,  no  doubt,  at  first,  for  effect  in  the 
local  elections,  it  proved  to  be  so  popular,  and  made  such 


162  MISSOURI. 

inroads  into  the  ranks  of  the  opposite  party,  that  it 
sjjeedily  outgrew  the  narrow  proportions  designed  for  it 
and  became  of  national  importance.  Instead  of  being 
a  struggle  between  the  Federalists,  and  Republicans  for 
supremacy  in  their  respective  States,  it  brought  about  a 
new  division  of  parties,  by  which  Congress  and  the  coun- 
try at  large  was  divided  geographically  upon  the  line  of 
slavery,  with  political  power  as  the  prize  of  the  contest. 


1 


CHAPTER  IX. 

FROM   1820  TO   1844. 

Called  upon  to  prepare  a  constitution  in  the  midst 
of  great  political  excitement,  and  at  a  time  when  the 
monetary  affairs  of  the  country  were  in  a  state  of  dis- 
organization, the  people  of  Missouri,  acting  through 
their  chosen  delegates,  set  about  the  work  with  coolness 
and  deliberation,  and,  all  things  considered,  they  framed 
an  instrument  that  was  a  marvel  of  moderation  and 
political  sagacity.  Among  its  provisions  were  a  few,  as 
for  instance  the  one  that  declared  ministers  of  the  gos- 
pel ineligible  to  certain  offices,  that  might  have  been 
improved,  or  better  still,  perhaps,  left  out  altogether; 
but,  take  it  all  in  all,  it  was  a  very  creditable  piece 
of  work  ;  and  if  we  may  judge  of  its  character  from 
the  length  of  time  that  it  remained  in  force  without 
any  material  alteration,  it  compared  not  unfavorably 
with  the  best  similar  instruments,  no  matter  when  or 
by  whom  they  may  have  been  "ordained  and  estab- 
lished." 

Especially  was  this  true  of  the  way  in  which  it  dealt 
with  the  financial  question.  The  lesson  the  people  of 
the  State  had  just  been  taught  by  the  failure  of  their 
local  banks  and  by  the  evils  of  which  this  was  in  some 
measure  the  cause,  severe  as  it  was,  seems  to  have  been 
thoroughly  learned,  and  it  now  brought  forth  good  fruit. 
As  a  result  of  the  experience  of  those  years,  a  healthy 


164  MISSOURI. 

distrust  of  banks  and  corporations  of  every  kind  per- 
vaded all  classes  of  the  community  ;  and  although  the 
establishment  in  St.  Louis,  in  1829,  of  a  branch  of  the 
United  States  Bank  gave  to  the  people  of  the  State  a 
currency  that  was  safer  and  more  convenient  than  any 
to  which  thej"^  had  hitherto  been  accustomed,  this  fact 
was  not  sufficient  to  eradicate  the  feelings  of  hostility 
with  which  they  regarded  all  such  institutions,  and  which 
they  imbedded  in  their  organic  law  in  the  shape  of  an 
article  limiting  the  power  of  the  legislature  to  "  the  in- 
corporation of  one  bank  and  no  more,  to  be  in  operation 
at  the  same  time."  Theoretically,  and  so  far  as  legisla- 
tive action  was  concerned,  they  were  a  hard-money  peo- 
ple, and  it  was  not  until  1837,  five  years  after  President 
Jackson's  veto  of  the  bill  rechartering  the  United  States 
Bank,  that  the  legislature,  in  answer  to  the  demands  of 
the  business  interests  of  the  State,  availed  themselves  of 
the  hberty  allowed  them,  and  agreed  to  the  establishment 
of  a  bank.  Meanwhile  the  notes  of  institutions  organ- 
ized and  doing  business  in  other  States  formed  the  bulk 
of  the  circulating  medium  ;  and  as  many  of  these  in- 
stitutions were  short-lived,  their  collapse  entailed  a  loss 
that  was  only  measured  by  the  extent  of  their  circulation, 
and  that  fell  with  peculiar  force  upon  those  who  were 
least  able  to  bear  it.  In  spite,  however,  of  the  uncer- 
tainty as  to  the  solvency  of  many  of  these  banks,  and  the 
consequent  fluctuation  in  the  value  of  their  notes,  their 
issues,  or  "  shin -plasters  "  as  they  were  contemptuously 
called,  continued  to  pass  current  until  the  refusal  of  the 
Bank  of  Missouri,  in  1839,  to  receive  or  pay  them  out 
placed  them  at  a  discount  so  far  as  sj)ecie  and  her  own 
bills  were  concerned. 

At  first  this  measure  created  not  a  little  indignation, 


FROM  lui'O  TO  1S44.  165 

and  the  merchants  of  St.  Louis,  the  chief  distributive 
point  of  the  State,  denounced  it  in  unmeasured  terms, 
but  the  bank  officials  remained  firm,  and  the  course 
of  events  soon  justified  their  action.  By  drawing  a 
broad  line  between  currency  and  specie  or  bankable 
funds,  they  furnished  a  standard,  safe  and  steady,  for 
the  adjustment  of  values  ;  and  this  brought  about  a  much 
needed  reform,  though  it  was  powerless  to  drive  the  dis- 
credited bills  out  of  circulation.  They  continued  to 
pass  current  in  small  daily  transactions,  but  when  ten- 
dered in  payment  of  large  amounts  they  were  subjected 
to  the  rate  of  discount  that  ruled  at  the  time  ;  and  those 
of  us  wlio  were  familiar  with  the  business  methods  that 
prevailed  in  those  days  can  hardly  have  forgotten  the 
numerous  Counterfeit  Detectors,  Bank-Note  Rejiorters, 
and  other  publications  of  a  similar  character,  that  were 
intended  to  keep  the  merchant  and  trader  advised  of 
the  condition,  from  week  to  week,  of  the  banks  whose 
notes  he  was  called  upon  to  handle. 

After  some  fifteen  or  twenty  years  of  this  experience, 
during  which  time  private  individuals  and  savings  in- 
stitutions supplied,  as  far  as  could  be  done,  the  j^lace 
of  banks,  the  constitution  of  the  State  was  amended  ; 
and,  in  1857,  it  was  so  changed  as  to  autliorize  the  es- 
tablishment of  banks  of  issue,  with  branches  in  differ- 
ent parts  of  the  State.  With  the  conservatism  that  has 
ever  been  one  of  their  marked  characteristics,  the  peo2:)le 
of  Missouri  did  not  plunge  recklessly  into  the  business 
of  banking,  but  they  very  wisely  limited  the  number  of 
these  parent  institutions  to  ten,  and  provided  that  their 
aggregate  capital  should  never  exceed  twenty  millions 
of  dollars,  an  outside  limit  that  cannot  be  considered 
extravagant  in  view  of  the  population  of  the  State  and 


166  MISSOURI. 

of  the  amount  of  business  annually  transacted.  An  ad- 
ditional safeguard  was  also  inserted  in  the  constitution, 
in  the  shape  of  a  clause  requiring  these  banks  to  be 
"  based  upon  a  specie  capital ;  "  and  in  the  law  of  1857, 
under  which  they  came  into  existence,  they  were  still 
farther  hedged  in  by  such  provisions  as  experience  had 
seemed  to  render  necessary.  So  far,  then,  as  it  could 
be  done  by  law,  every  care  was  taken  to  insure  the  stabil- 
ity of  these  institutions  ;  and  it  is  but  just  to  say  that 
they  were  founded  upon  a  solid  basis,  and  that  with  but 
few  exceptions  they  have  been  well  managed. 

Unfortunately,  they  were  begun  at  a  most  inauspicious 
time.  The  panic  of  1857,  as  sharj)  as  it  was  short, 
found  them  unprepared  for  the  demands  that  were 
made  upon  them,  and  a  few  years  later,  almost  before 
they  had  recovered  from  its  effects,  they  were  called 
upon  to  share  in  the  reverses  that  marked  the  opening 
years  of  the  civil  war.  With  but  one  exception,  that  of 
the  Exchange  Bank  of  St.  Louis,  they  were  obliged  to 
bend  before  the  storm ;  and  during  the  whole  of  that 
eventful  period  they  had  to  suspend  specie  payments. 
The  legislature,  however,  refused  to  forfeit  their  char- 
ters, so  that  with  the  return  of  peace  they  were  able  to 
resume  their  accustomed  functions  ;  and  to-day  they  are 
doing  their  legitimate  woi'k  in  facilitating  the  business 
of  the  communities  in  which  they  exist,  though  almost 
all  of  them,  taking  advantage  of  different  acts  of  Con- 
gress, have  ceased  to  be  state  institutions,  and  are  now 
known  as  national  banks. 

But  whilst  the  people  of  the  State  have  in  the  main 
shown  themselves  to  be  decidedly  conservative  in  the 
management  of  their  monetary  affairs,  public  as  well  as 
private,  there  have  been  times  when  they  appear  to  have 


FROM  1820   TO  1844.  1G7 

been  unable  to  resist  the  tendency  to  speculation  and 
overtrading  which  seems  an  inevitable  attendant  upon 
all  new  and  rapidly  developing  communities.  As  a 
consequence,  they  have  not  been  exempt  from  the  pen- 
alty that  attaches  to  such  faulty  methods  of  doing  busi- 
ness, and  makes  itself  felt  in  the  storms  which,  from 
time  to  time,  sweep  over  the  financial  world.  Probably 
the  severest  of  these  storms,  not  so  much  on  account  of 
the  amount  destroyed  as  from  the  number  of  sufferers, 
was  the  one  wliich  visited  the  country  in  1837,  and 
which,  following  close  upon  the  expiration  of  the  char- 
ter of  the  United  States  Bank,  is  often  ascribed  to  that 
event,  though  it  would  be  going  too  far  to  assign  it  to 
that  as  the  sole,  or  even  a  sufficient,  cause.  The  truth 
is  that  so  far  from  having  been  a  prime  factor  in  bring- 
ing on  the  "  hard  times  "  of  1837,  the  fate  of  the  bank 
had  little  or  nothing  to  do  with  it.  This  is,  no  doubt, 
contrary  to  the  impression  most  sedulously  cultivated  by 
the  Whigs  of  that  day,  but  it  can  hardly  be  questioned 
in  view  of  the  fact  that  although  the  charter  of  the 
bank  did  not  expire  until  1836,  yet  the  death-blow  was 
really  given  to  the  institution  in  1832,  four  years  ear- 
lier ;  and  this  measure,  instead  of  causing  a  stringency 
in  the  money  market  and  a  depression  in  prices,  as  it 
would  have  done  if  there  had  been  any  necessary  con- 
nection between  the  fate  of  the  bank  and  the  hard  times 
of  1837,  was  followed,  first,  by  a  season  of  prosperity, 
and  subsequently,  as  such  seasons  often  are,  by  one  of 
inflation,  when  for  a  time,  say  from  1834  to  1837,  a 
fever  of  speculation  ran  riot  throughout  the  land.  Not 
only  individuals,  but  States,  caught  the  infection,  and  it 
is  to  the  reaction  following  upon  this  condition  of  affairs 
that   the    student  must  look  for  an  explanation   of  the 


168  MISSOURI. 

crisis  which  has  given  Van  Buren's  administration  such 
an  undesirable  prominence  in  the  financial  annals  of  the 
country. 

To  picture  the  saturnalia  that  prevailed  during  these 
years  of  inflation  were  an  idle  task.  All  classes  seem 
to  have  engaged  in  it,  and  no  portion  of  the  country  was 
exempt.  During  its  prevalence  schemes  without  num- 
ber, some  of  which  would  have  taxed  the  resources  of  the 
wealthiest  communities,  were  launched  upon  the  market ; 
and  there  were  few  of  them  that  did  not  find  earnest 
advocates.  Only  a  fraction  of  the  number,  it  is  true, 
ever  came  to  anything,  but  to  carry  them  on  required 
more  money  than  was  then  in  circulation.  To  sujiply  this 
deficiency  the  people  in  some  of  the  States,  forgetful  of 
the  lesson  of  1819,  resorted  to  an  indefinite  increase  of 
local,  or  as  they  were  sometimes  called  "  j^et,"  banks. 
They  seem  to  have  imagined  that  these  institutions,  in- 
stead of  being  mere  instruments  for  facilitating  com- 
mercial intercourse,  were,  in  some  mysterious  way,  to 
create  wealth.  Hence  in  some  portions  of  the  country 
they  were  chartered  in  great  numbers,  without  any  re- 
gard to  the  demands  of  the  communities  in  which  they 
were  expected  to  do  business,  and  in  defiance  of  all  laws 
of  finance,  and  occasionally,  Ave  may  add,  of  honesty.  In 
one  of  the  Western  States,  an  agricultural  one,  and 
therefore  relatively  independent  of  such  facilities,  there 
was  at  one  time  a  bank  for  every  five  thousand  inhabit- 
ants. This  number  is  said  to  have  been  subsequently 
increased,  and  a  writer  of  that  day,  speaking  of  the  con- 
dition of  affairs  which  then  prevailed,  says,  with  pardon- 
able exaggeration,  "  that  every  village  plat  with  a  house, 
or  even  without  a  house,  if  it  had  a  hollow  stump  to 
serve  as  a  vault,  was  the  site  of  a  bank  ;  "  and  ''  that  it 


FROM  1820   TO  1844.  1G9 

was  easy  for  any  one  to  obtain  their  bills  who  could  give 
reasonable  assurance  that  he  would  circulate  them  at  a 
distance  and  keep  them  afloat." 

In  tliis  way,  moving  steadily  on,  but  ever  in  a  vicious 
circle,  affairs  went  from  bad  to  worse,  and  when  finally 
the  crash  came,  Missouri,  in  so  far  as  she  had  held  a 
conservative  course  and  kept  aloof  from  the  ruinous 
systems  of  internal  improvement  in  which  certain  of  her 
sister  States  had  indidged,  was  sj^ared  some  of  the  ca- 
lamities that  they  were  called  on  to  endui'e.  Still  she 
was  not  permitted  to  escape.  With  her  growth  in  wealth 
and  population,  there  had  been  a  corresponding  increase 
in  commerce  ;  and  her  business  interests  were  so  closely 
united  with  those  of  other  and  less  conservative  communi- 
ties that  they  could  not  be  separated.  For  good  or  evil 
they  were  inextricably  bound  together,  and  it  was  im- 
possible that  one  should  suffer  without  affecting  the  other 
injuriously. 

Her  people,  too,  in  the  management  of  their  private 
affairs,  appear  to  have  been  forgetful  of  the  prudential 
considerations  that  governed  their  public  action.  For 
years  they  had  witnessed  the  steady  tide  of  immigration 
that  had  poured  into  the  State,  had  noted  the  advance 
in  different  kinds  of  projDerty,  especially  real  estate, 
which  was  thus  brought  about ;  and  it  was  but  natural, 
as  this  stream  of  settlers  still  rolled  in  unchecked,  to 
look  forward  to  a  continuance  of  the  era  of  prosperity 
of  which  it  was  at  once  the  cause  and  a  visible  sign.  So 
long  as  they  saw  the  State  gaining  in  all  the  elements 
of  wealth,  they  did  not  think  it  possible  that  a  condition 
of  affairs  could  arise  in  which  individuals  composing 
that  State  were  to  suffer.  In  this  belief  they  acted,  and, 
heedless  of  the  impending  storm,  they  made  every  prep- 


170  MISSOURI. 

aration  to  share  in  the  golden  harvest  which  was  so 
contidently  anticipated.  They  bought  and  sold  with  a 
freedom  that  savored  of  recklessness  ;  engaged  in  enter- 
prises that  under  other  circumstances  would  have  been 
regarded  as  too  rash  for  consideration  ;  and  when  at  last 
the  day  of  reckoning  came,  it  found  tliem  steeped  in 
debt,  and  with  lines  of  credit  extended  far  beyond  the 
limits  of  safety.  Many  of  them^sank  under  the  weight ; 
but  the  great  majority,  after  a  few  years  of  patient 
labor  and  enforced  economy,  were  able  to  resume  their 
positions  in  the  world  of  commerce.  It  was  a  season  of 
trial  for  all,  relieved  somewhat  by  local  stay  laws  and 
such  expedients,  but  none  the  less  enduring  and  full  of 
distress.  The  laws  of  finance  had  been  set  at  naught, 
and  the  penalty  had  to  be  paid.  Slowly  and  after  much 
suffering  the  process  of  liquidation  was  accomplished, 
and  an  era  of  prosperity  once  more  dawned  upon  the 
stricken  people  ;  but  the  record  of  these  years,  written  in 
the  dockets  of  the  courts  and  in  the  long  list  of  bank- 
ruptcies, will  ever  remain  as  a  warning. 

Naturally  enough,  the  "  hard  times,"  as  this  period  of 
distress  was  called,  entered  largely  into  the  political  dis- 
cussions of  the  day,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  as  to  the 
important  part  it  was  made  to  play  in  bringing  about  the 
defeat  of  Van  Bnren  in  the  presidential  election  of  1840. 
It  had  come  upon  the  country  during  his  administration  ; 
was  associated  in  the  minds  of  many  with  the  veto  of  the 
bank  bill,  which  had  taken  place  some  years  previously 
and  whilst  his  political  friend  and  predecessor  was  in 
power  ;  and  although,  as  has  been  said,  it  owed  its  origin 
to  causes  which  neither  he  nor  his  party  could  control, 
yet  the  Whigs,  as  the  opposition  was  then  termed,  taking 
advantage  of  the  order  in  which  these  events  had  oc- 


FROM   ISOO   TO  1844.  171 

curred,  succeeded  in  making  it  appear  that  there  was 
some  necessary  connection  between  them,  and  conse- 
quently that  he  and  his  political  allies  were  responsible 
for  the  distress  which  then  prevailed.  It  was  an  old 
fallacy,  brought  forward  for  the  occasion,  but  it  proved 
effective  among  a  people  whom  financial  troubles  had 
made  eager  for  a  change  ;  and  taken  in  connection  with 
the  military  reputation  which  General  Harrison,  the  op- 
posing candidate,  had  acquired  in  the  war  of  1812.  it  led 
to  the  political  revolution  that  resulted  in  his  election  and 
the  success  of  the  Whigs.  It  was  the  first  time  in  the 
century  that  they  or  the  party  of  which  they  were  the 
legitimate  descendants  had  won  a  popular  verdict  at  the 
polls,  and  however  desirable  this  may  have  been  for 
other  reasons,  its  mei-it  is  somewhat  obscured  by  the  fact 
that  it  was  due,  not  so  much  to  an  intelligent  dissent 
from  the  policy  of  the  Democrats  as  it  was  to  the  adroit 
use  made  of  a  condition  of  affairs  for  which  the  people 
at  large  were  responsible,  and  to  a  \\i\A  and  senseless, 
but  shrewdly  manufactured,  excitement  over  military 
events  that  were  of  secondary  importance. 

In  this  revolution,  the  people  of  Missouri  had  no  part. 
They  were  essentially  agricultural,  and  therefore  com- 
paratively independent  of  banks  and  banking  facilities. 
They  were  earnest  believers,  too,  in  gold  and  silver  as 
being  not  only  the  most  desirable,  but  in  fact  the  only, 
kind  of  money  that  Congress  could  legally  authorize,  and 
consequently  they  sympathized  fully  with  the  Democrats 
in  their  hostility  to  the  national  bank,  which  they  had 
come  to  regard  as  an  engine  of  political  corruption.  For 
these  reasons  among  others,  they  had  no  faith  in  the  ex- 
planation which  the  Whigs  were  wont  to  give  of  the 
origin  of  the  financial  distress  that  then  prevailed  ;  and 


172  MISSOURI. 

as  they  were  correspondingly  distrustful  of  the  promised 
prosperity  that  was  to  follow  upon  a  change  in  the  ad- 
ministration at  Washington,  they  could  see  no  reason  for 
surrendering  their  political  convictions.  Hence  it  was 
that  in  the  election  of  1840  they  refused  to  "  hand  the 
knee  to  Baal,"  and  voted  with  the  Democrats,  as  they 
had  done  from  the  time  that  jiarties  were  organized  upon 
the  hasis  upon  which  they  then  stood,  and  as  indeed  they 
have  continued  to  do,  to  this  day,  whenever  they  have 
been  permitted  to  give  a  full  and  free  expression  to  their 
wishes  at  the  polls. 

Of  the  causes,  then,  that  led  the  people  of  the  State  thus 
early  to  identify  themselves  with  the  Democratic  party, 
hostility  to  the  bank  may  be  said  to  have  been  the  most 
influential.  At  all  events,  the  bill  to  recharter  that  in- 
stitution was  the  first  distinctively  national  issue  upon 
which  they  were  called  to  act,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt 
that  the  position  which  they  then  assumed  m  favor  of 
"  hard  money  "  was  due  in  great  part  to  the  recollection 
of  the  bitter  experience  through  which  they  had  passed 
during  the  closing  years  of  Missouri's  career  as  a  Teri'i- 
tory  and  the  beginning  of  her  life  as  a  State. 

That  this  direction  may  have  been  given  to  the  drift 
of  opinion  by  the  hostility  which  the  Federalists  had 
shown  to  the  admission  of  the  State  into  the  Union  is 
undoubtedly  true  ;  and  so  far  as  ojjposition  to  slavery 
can  be  said  to  have  been  the  cause  of  this  hostility,  it 
may  properly  be  counted  as  a  factor  in  the  problem. 
But  even  if  this  be  granted  we  shall  have  to  admit  that 
its  influence  was  but  short-lived ;  for,  owing  to  the  neces- 
sity which  then  existed  of  providing  a  remedy  for  the 
disorder  into  which  the  business  affairs  of  the  country 
had  fallen,  the  feeling  of  irritation  engendered  by  the 


FROM   1820    TO   1S44.  173 

course  of  the  Federalists  upon  this  occasion  disappeared 
almost  as  ra])idly  as  it  had  sprung  up.  Long  before  the 
close  of  President  Monroe's  administration  in  1824,  the 
slavery  question  had  given  way  to  more  pressing  con- 
siderations, and  political  parties,  being  left  free  to  crys- 
tallize around  new  centres,  gradually  took  on  the  forms 
under  which  they  fought  the  battle  that  resulted  in  the 
destruction  of  the  national  bank. 

But  whilst  it  is  true  that,  so  far  as  the  country  at  large 
was  concerned,  the  slavery  question  had  disappeared 
thus  suddenly  and  entirely  from  the  field  of  politics,  it  is 
a  singular  fact  that  there  never  was  a  time  when,  within 
the  State,  the  sentiment  of  opjjosition  to  this  institution 
was  so  active  as  it  was  during  the  twelve  years  covered  by 
the  administrations  of  the  younger  Adams  and  General 
Jackson,  or  when  it  made  such  headway.  To  a  certain 
extent  this  was  due  to  the  movement  in  favor  of  gradual 
emancipation,  of  which  Henry  Clay  was  the  great  ex- 
ponent, and  of  which  the  Whigs,  considered  as  a  party, 
are  thought  to  have  been  the  peculiar  advocates.  In 
Kentucky,  no  doubt  they  were  so,  and  it  maj'  also  have 
been  true  of  other  portions  of  the  South  and  West ;  but 
in  Missouri  it  was  not  the  case.  Here  and  upon  this 
point  both  parties  were  in  accord ;  and  as  early  as  1828 
a  number  of  prominent  men,  "  representing  almost  every 
district  in  the  State,  and  consisting  of  about  equal  num- 
bers of  Whigs  and  Democrats,"  agreed  upon  a  plan  by 
which  they  hoped  to  secure  the  passage  of  a  law  that 
would  provide  for  gradual  emancipation,  and  thus  in  time 
get  rid  of  slavery.  At  a  private  meeting  which  was 
then  held,  they  determined  to  urge  all  candidates  at  the 
approaching  election  to  approve  of  such  a  measure,  and 
resolutions  to  this  effect  were  drawn  up  and  secretly  dis- 


174  MISSOURI. 

trlbuted,  "  with  the  understanding  that  they  were  to  be 
placed  before  the  people  of  the  State  in  the  shape  of 
memorials,  and  both  parties  were  to  urge  the  people  to 
sign  them."  Among  those  who  took  part  in  this  meet- 
ing were  United  States  Senators  Benton  and  Barton, 
the  former  of  whom  was  at  that  time,  and  for  many- 
years  after,  the  recognized  leader  of  thfe  Democrats  in  the 
State,  whilst  among  the  others  there  were  those  whose 
influence  within  their  respective  spheres  was  not  less 
potent.  Indeed,  such  was  the  strength  of  the  "  combina- 
tion "  that  the  Hon.  John  Wilson,  to  whom  we  are  in- 
debted for  this  curious  bit  of  history,  and  who  was  a  prom- 
inent Whig  politician  of  that  day,  does  not  hesitate  to 
declare  that  they  had  the  power  to  carry  out  that  pro- 
ject. Unfortunately,  however,  before  the  day  arrived 
upon  which  the  attempt  was  to  be  made,  "  it  was  pub- 
lished in  the  newspapers  generally  that  Arthur  Tappan, 
of  New  York,  had  entertained  at  his  private  table  some 
negro  men  ;  that,  in  fact,  these  negroes  had  rode  in  his 
private  carriage  with  his  daughters."  This  may  or  may 
not  have  been  true,  but  it  was  generally  believed  in  Mis- 
souri, and  such  was  the  furor  it  raised  throughout  the 
State  that  those  who  had  been  instrumental  in  getting 
up  the  meeting  did  not  dare  to  let  their  memorials  see 
the  light.  ^ 

1  Mr.  Wilson  continues  :  "  As  well  as  I  can  call  to  mind,  of  the 
individuals  who  composed  this  secret  meeting,  I  am  the  only  one 
left  to  tell  the  tale  ;  but  for  that  story  of  the  conduct  of  the  great 
original  fanatic  on  this  subject  we  should  have  carried,  under  the 
leadership  of  Barton  and  Benton,  our  project,  and  began  in  future 
the  emancipation  of  the  colored  race  that  Avould  long  since  have 
been  followed  by  Kentucky,  Maryland,  Virginia,  North  Carolina, 
Tennessee,  etc.  Our  purpose  further,  after  we  got  such  a  law 
safely  placed  on  the  statute  book,  was  to  have  followed  it  up  by  a 


FROM  1S20    TO  1844.  175 

To  those  who  are  accustomed  to  look  at  the  occur- 
rences of  those  days  through  the  medium  of  subsequent 
events,  it  is  difficult  to  understand  how  so  slight  a  matter 
as  the  entertainment  of  a  negro  by  a  somewhat  noted 
abolitionist  of  New  York  could  have  influenced  the  ac- 
tion of  earnest,  sensible  men  who  were  engaged,  with 
good  promise  of  success,  in  what  they  must  have  felt  to 
be  a  great  social  reform  ;  but  among  those  of  us  who 
can  remember  the  tremendous  influence  which  such  tri- 
vial incidents,  when  skillfully  handled,  excited  tlirough- 
out  the  South,  there  will  be  no  hesitation  in  accepting 
the  fact  as  here  given,  nor  will  it  be  necessary  to  go 
very  far  to  find  the  explanation.  Color,  it  will  be  re- 
membered, was  in  all  this  region  a  badge  of  servitude,  the 
one  mark  of  inferiority  that  could  neither  be  concealed 
nor  gainsaid,  whilst,  on  the  other  hand,  every  white  man, 
whatsoever  his  condition,  was  in  theory,  at  least,  the 
equal  socially  of  his  neighbor.  Starting  from  this  point, 
the  average  Southerner,  by  a  process  of  reasoning  wholly 
illogical  but  not  unnatural,  had  worked  himself  into  the 
conviction  that  freedom  to  the  blacks  necessarily  meant 
their  social  recognition  ;  and  when  called  upon  for  the 
proof,  he  referred  to  the  Tappan  dinner  and  similar  in- 
cidents. Of  course  it  is  easy  at  this  late  day  to  detect 
the  fallacy  in  this  mode  of  reasoning,  but  at  that  time, 
and  situated  as  he  was,  it  was  not  so.  From  his  point 
of  view  the  argument  was  sound,  and  it  was  owing  to 
the  belief  in  the  experimental  as  well  as  logical  truth  of 
the  conclusion  to  which  he  had  come  that  the  movement 

pro^nsion  requiring  the  masters  of  those  who  should  be  born  to  be 
free  to  teach  them  to  read  and  ■write.  This  shows  you  how  little 
a  thing  turns  the  destiny  of  nations." — Commonwealth  of  Missouri, 
p.  223.    St.  Louis,  1877. 


176  MISSOURI. 

in  favor  of  gradual  emancipation,  which,  up  to  this  time, 
had  made  such  notable  progress  among  the  slaveholders 
of  the  State,  was  brought  to  an  untimely  end. 

A  few  years  after  the  events  here  narrated,  Lovejo}'' 
took  up  the  work  and  began  his  ill-advised  agitation  in 
favor  of  the  same  cause,  but  under  very  different  condi- 
tions. Owing  to  the  denunciations  wiiich  the  abolition- 
ists of  the  North  were  now  heaping  upon  slavery  and 
slaveholders,  the  Southerners  not  only  refused  to  take 
any  measures  for  ridding  themselves  of  what  a  large 
number  of  them  regarded  as  an  evil,  but  they  would  not 
listen  to  arguments  in  favor  of  a  policy  with  which,  only 
a  few  short  years  before,  they  had  been  in  full  sym- 
pathy. Accordingly,  when  in  1833,  on  his  return  from 
the  theological  school  at  Princeton,  Lovejoy  began,  in 
St.  Louis,  the  publication  of  his  paper,  his  condemnation 
of  slavery  and  pleas  for  gradual  emancipation  fell  upon 
unwilling  and  even  hostile  ears,  though  there  was  noth- 
ing new  or  objectionable  in  the  doctrines  he  advocated  ; 
and  the  tone  and  temper  of  his  utterances,  when  con- 
trasted with  the  fierce  philippics  of  later  times,  were 
as  gentle  as  the  cooings  of  a  dove.  In  spite  of  this 
fact,  they  gave  occasion  to  much  iU  feeling,  and  by  way 
of  allaying  the  excitement,  and  paving  the  way  to  the 
continuance  of  his  Journal  as  a  religious  publication, 
pure  and  simple,  a  number  of  his  friends  and  principal 
supporters,  among  whom  was  Hamilton  R.  Gamble,  the 
Union  Governor  of  Missouri  during  the  war  of  seces- 
sion, advised  him  "  to  distrust  his  own  judgment  so  far 
as  to  pass  over  in  silence  everything  connected  with 
slavery."  This  he  would  not  agree  to  do,  having  sworn, 
as  he  himself  tells  us,  "  eternal  enmity  to  slavery,  and 
being  determined  by  the  blessing  of  God  never  to  go 


FROM  1820   TO   1S44.  177 

back,"  In  consequence  of  his  persistence  in  this  objec- 
tionable course,  he  found,  at  the  end  of  a  year  or  two, 
that  a  longer  residence  in  St.  Louis  was  neither  profit- 
able nor  safe ;  and  in  July,  1836,  he  so  far  deferred 
to  public  opinion  that  he  announced  his  intention  of 
removing  to  Alton,  Illinois.  Before  he  could  do  so,  his 
office  was  sacked,  his  press  and  types  were  thrown  into 
the  street,  but  no  personal  injury  was  done  him.  When 
he  arrived  in  Alton,  he  resumed  his  crusade  against 
slavery,  in  defiance  of  pledges  which  his  opponents  as- 
sert he  had  made  to  the  contrary,  and  this  speedily  in- 
volved him  in  fresh  trouble.  One  press  after  another 
was  destroyed,  and  it  was  while  defending  a  third  that 
he  was  shot,  though  not  until  he,  or  some  of  his  friends, 
had  fired  upon  and  killed  one  of  the  mob. 

With  the  circumstances  of  this  sad  tragedy,  or  with 
the  subsequent  attempt  of  certain  admirers  to  apotheo- 
size Lovejoy,  we  do  not  propose  to  concern  ourselves. 
He  did  not  meet  his  death  in  a  slave  State,  or  at  the 
hands  of  slaveholders ;  and  so  far  as  the  influence 
which  he  is  said  to  have  exerted  in  bringing  about  the 
final  settlement  of  this  question  is  discernible,  it  would 
have  been  better  for  the  cause  he  had  so  much  at  heart, 
and  for  the  people  whom  he  sought  to  benefit,  if  he  had 
never  been  born.  That  he  had  the  abstract  right  to 
speak  and  write  as  he  did,  holding  himself  amenable  to 
the  laws  of  his  country,  is  true,  and  so,  also,  it  is  true 
that  a  person  may  have  the  right  to  go  into  a  powder 
mill  with  a  lighted  candle  ;  but  if  any  one  should  insist 
upon  doing  so,  he  would  soon  be  taught  that  his  neigh- 
bors had  certain  rights,  not  perhaps  expressly  guaran- 
teed by  law,  but  which  it  would  not  be  prudent  to  ignore. 
Thus  it  was  with  Lovejoy.    Whether  rightly  or  wrongly 


178  MISSOURI. 

it  matters  not,  the  teachings  which  a  few  years  before* 
had  been  received  in  Missouri  with  a  fair  share  of  favor 
were  now  considered  as  being  not  only  injurious,  but 
positively  dangerous  ;  and  in  putting  a  stop  to  them,  the 
people  of  St.  Louis  took  the  law  into  their  own  hands, 
but  in  doing  so,  they  exercised  a  right  or  a  power  —  it 
is  immaterial  by  which  name  you  call  it  —  which  is  in- 
herent in  all  communities,  and  which  has  been  uniformly 
exercised  in  our  country  whenever  and  wherever  the 
occasion  demanded. 

With  the  removal  of  Lovejoy  from  St.  Louis,  the 
movement  in  favor  of  gradual  emancipation  in  Missouri 
came  to  an  end.  It  was,  certainly,  a  most  dismal  fail- 
ure, and  yet  in  some  respects  it  is  one  of  the  most  in- 
teresting and  instructive  episodes  in  American  history. 
Properly  interpreted,  it  teaches  us  how  prompt  the 
Anglo-American  is  to  resent  anything  that  looks  like 
outside  dictation  even  from  his  own  countrymen,  and 
how  futile  it  is  to  attempt  to  improve  the  domestic  insti- 
tutions of  our  neighbors  by  a  system  of  abuse,  no  matter 
how  much  it  may  be  deserved.  It  also  shows  us  that 
there  was  a  time,  and  that  not  very  long  ago,  when  the 
people  of  slaveholding  St.  Louis  and  free  Alton  were 
equally  intolerant  of  the  anti-slavery  agitation  ;  and  if 
it  does  not  throw  any  clear  light  upon  the  formation 
of  political  parties  as  they  existed  at  the  time,  it  fore- 
shadows, to  some  extent,  the  course  of  the  border  states 
in  the  war  of  the  rebellion,  and  it  enables  us  to  say  with 
certainty  that,  in  the  Missouri  of  that  day,  there  was  in 
the  Democratic  party  a  strong  contingent  of  emancipa- 
tionists, just  as  there  was  some  fifteen  or  twenty  years 
later,  when  Frank  Blair  and  Gratz  Brown  raised  the 
banner  of  freedom  and  cariied  it  to  victory. 


FROM  1820   TO  1844.  179 

Another  problem  with  which  the  Missourians  of  that 
day  were  called  upon  to  grapple,  and  which,  at  one 
time,  threatened  the  peace  of  the  State,  was  the  so- 
called  Mormon  war.  As  early  as  1831,  Joseph  Smith, 
"  the  Seer,  Revelator,  Translator,  and  Prophet "  of  the 
new  faith,  visited  Western  Missouri,  then  but  thinly 
populated,  on  a  tour  of  inspection ;  and  soon  afterwards 
bands  of  Mormons,  or,  as  they  call  themselves,  Latter 
Day  Saints,  began  to  arrive  and  settle  in  the  neigh- 
borhood of  Independence,  a  town  situated  on  the  south 
bank  of  the  Missouri  River  near  the  border  of  the  State. 
This  spot,  we  are  told,  is  "  the  place  selected  by  God 
for  the  centre  stake  of  Zion  ;  "  and  although  there  is 
to-day  but  little  of  that  fair  land  of  which  the  Saints 
can  claim  full  and  undisturbed  possession,  yet  they  still 
look  forward  to  a  return  to  the  homes  which  they  once 
had  there,  and  to  the  time  when  they  shall  build  there 
"  the  most  magnificent  temple  on  the  face  of  the  earth 
to  the  name  of  Jehovah." 

In  the  year  succeeding  the  first  settlements  of  the 
Mormons  in  this  neighborhood,  their  numbers  were 
largely  increased  by  ari'ivals,  chiefly  from  Ohio,  where 
they  appear  to  have  been  badly  treated.  Smith  himself 
having  been  "  daubed  with  tar  and  feathers  "  at  a  place 
called  Hiram.  They  established  a  "  mercantile  house," 
as  it  was  termed,  in  Independence  ;  opened  some  two 
hundred  farms  in  the  adjoining  country ;  planted  or- 
chards, and  "  commenced  many  extensive  improve- 
ments." They  also  issued,  in  June  of  this  year,  the 
first  number  of  a  periodical  which  was  devoted,  among 
other  things,  to  "  publishing  the  revelations  of  God  to 
the  church."  These  revelations  must  have  been  of  a 
somewhat  partial  character,  for  they  are  said  to  have 


180  MISSOURI. 

promised  most  wonderful  things  to  the  faithful,  whilst, 
at  the  same  time,  "  they  denounced  equally  wonderful 
things  against  the  ungodly  Gentiles."  As  a  conse- 
quence, the  Gentiles  became  much  incensed,  for  in 
tliose  days  people  were  not  as  tolerant  in  such  matters 
as  they  are  to-day.  It  may  be,  too,  that  they  were  an- 
gered by  the  interference,  real  or  supposed,  of  the  Mor- 
mons with  their  slaves ;  and  they  certainly  had  very  se- 
rious misgivings  as  to  the  safety  of  their  persons  and 
property  whenever  the  Mormons  should  obtain  the  con- 
trol of  the  county,  as  they  were  certain  to  do  if  the  rate 
at  which  they  were  then  increasing  should  be  kept  up 
for  any  length  of  time.  For  these  and  other  reasons 
that  seemed  to  them  good  and  sufficient,  they  determined 
to  drive  the  new-comers  from  the  county,  and  accord- 
ingly they  destroyed  the  house  in  which  the  objection- 
able paper  was  printed,  and  pitched  the  press  and  types 
into  the  street.  They  also  tarred  and  feathered  the 
presiding  bishop  and  one  or  two  of  the  leading  mem- 
bers of  the  church,  whipped  others,  and  burned  down  a 
number  of  their  houses.  These  outrages  brought  on 
an  armed  collision,  which  seems  to  have  resulted  in 
favor  of  the  Mormons.  Their  success  was  but  tem- 
porary, for  in  a  few  days  they  were  completely  over- 
awed, and  as  a  condition  of  safety  they  were  required 
to  give  up  their  arms  and  leave  the  county  within  a 
specified  time.  This  they  did,  sontie  fifteen  hundred 
of  them,  according  to  their  own  account,  crossing  the 
river  and  taking  refuge  in  Clay  and  the  neighboring 
counties.  Here  they  suffered  greatly,  for,  owing  to  the 
want  of  transportation,  they  had  been  obliged  to  leave 
most  of  their  goods  and  chattels  behind,  and,  conse- 
quently, they  were  but  illy  prepared  to  withstand  the 


FRO.\f  1800    TO    1844.  181 

winter  cold  that  was  then  upon  them.  In  the  spring, 
an  effort  was  made  to  bring  about  some  arrangement  by 
which  they  were  to  be  paid  for  the  property  which  they 
had  not  been  able  to  take  with  them,  and  a  committee, 
composed  of  some  of  the  leading  citizens  of  Jackson 
County,  was  sent  over  to  see  if  it  were  possible  to  agree 
upon  the  basis  of  a  settlement.  The  effort  came  to 
naught,  as  the  demands  of  the  Mormons  were  thought 
to  be  excessive,  and  equally  fruitless  was  their  appeal  to 
the  Executive  of  the  State  and  to  the  courts  for  protec- 
tion and  redress. 

At  the  end  of  three  or  four  yeai'S,  during  which  time 
these  misguided  people  had  been  driven  from  Clay  and 
Carroll  counties,  the  great  bulk  of  them,  reinforced  by 
large  accessions  from  the  east,  had  gathered  together  in 
Caldwell  county,  where  they  had  built  up  a  town  which 
they  called  Far  "West.  Speaking  from  a  material  point 
of  view  they  were,  in  the  main,  a  hard  working  jieople, 
chiefly  given  to  agriculture,  though  there  was  no  lack 
among  them  of  skilled  mechanics  and  shrewd  merchants. 
As  an  evidence  of  the  prosperity  which  had  thus  far  at- 
tended their  efforts,  they  are  said  to  have  opened  in  this 
and  the  neighboring  counties  two  thousand  farms,  and 
we  are  also  told  that  from  the  time  of  their  arrival  in 
Missouri  until  their  expulsion,  they  had  paid  to  the 
United  States  government,  for  land  alone,  three  hundred 
and  eighteen  thousand  dollars.  At  the  minimum  price  of 
one  dollar  and  a  quarter  per  acre  this  would  give  them 
over  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  acres,  for  the  most 
of  which  they  still  hold  the  patents.  ^  This  is  certainly 
a  very  favorable  showing,  but  it  is  only  one  side  of  the 

^  Discourse  by  Prexident  George  A.  Smith,  delivered  in  the  New 
Tabernacle,  Salt  Lake  Citj-,  July  25,  1869. 


182  MISSOURI. 

story.  On  the  other  hand,  they  are  represented,  and  no 
doubt  with  some  degree  of  truth,  as  having  been  igno- 
rant, bigoted,  and  arrogant,  easily  led  by  the  designing 
and  unscrupulous  men  whom  their  very  prosperity  had 
attracted,  and  not  overly  observant  of  the  rights  of  their 
neighbors.  Preaching  and  believing,  or  affecting  to  be- 
lieve, that  "  the  Lord  had  given  the  earth  and  the  full- 
ness thereof  to  his  people,"  and  that  they  were  his  peo- 
ple, bands  of  the  more  lawless  among  them  are  said  to 
have  spent  their  time  strolling  about  the  country,  help- 
ing themselves  to  whatsoever  they  pleased  and  other- 
wise spoiling  the  Egyptians,  or  in  their  more  homely 
phrase,  "milking  the  Gentiles."  As  they  were  largely 
in  the  majority,  and  the  county  officers  were  of  their 
way  of  thinking  on  this  point,  they  were  not  interfered 
with  "  until  their  lawless  course  excited  the  indignation 
of  the  Gentile  settlers,  who,  not  being  able  to  obtain  jus- 
tice in  a  lawful  manner,  i-esorted  to  violence  and  retalia- 
tion in  kind,  until  many  a  dark  and  unlawful  deed  was 
perpetrated  on  both  sides."  -^ 

In  this  condition  of  thinly  disguised  hostility,  matters 
remained  until  1838,  when  the  Mormons  began  to  re- 
sist by  force  what  they  were  pleased  to  term  the  attacks 
of  the  mob,  but  which,  according  to  Gentile  authority, 
were  nothing  more  than  the  efforts  of  a  sheriff's  posse 
to  execute  the  duly  authorized  processes  of  the  courts. 
This  of  course  placed  the  Mormons  in  the  wrong,  and 
gave  Governor  Boggs  the  opportunity,  which  he  promptly 
seized,  of  calling  out  the  militia  for  the  purpose  of  put- 
ting down  the  insurrection  and  enforcing  the  laws.  Un- 
der  his    proclamation   a  large  body  of  troops  entered 

^  Switzler,  in  the  Commonwealth  of  Missouri,  p.  244.  St.  Louis, 
1877. 


FROM  ISOO   TO  1S44.  183 

Caldwell  county,  and  after  a  skirmish  at  Haughn's  mill, 
which  seems  to  have  been  rather  a  butcher}^,  the  Mor- 
mons were  obliged  to  give  up  their  arms  and  agree  to 
leave  the  State,  except  their  leaders,  who  were  to  be 
surrendered  for  trial.  These  conditions  were  certainly 
very  hard,  but  they  were  the  best  that  could  be  obtained  ; 
and  if  we  ma}"  credit  Mormon  writers,  it  was  owing  to 
the  determined  stand  of  Alexander  "W.  Donijihan  that 
they  were  not  more  rigorous.  As  it  was,  the  scenes  that 
took  place  when  the  time  came  for  carrying  out  these 
terms  are  said  to  have  beggared  description.  The  sea- 
son was  already  far  advanced,  transportation  was  totally 
insufficient,  and  yet  notwithstanding  these  silent  appeals 
for  delay  some  thousands  ^  of  these  unfortunate  creatures 
of  all  ages,  sizes,  conditions,  and  of  both  sexes  were 
driven  from  their  homes,  and  compelled  to  cross  almost 
the  entire  northern  part  of  the  State  before  they  could 
hope  to  find  a  resting  place.  As  a  rule,  they  were  poor, 
had  nothing  but  the  small  farms  from  which  they  were 
driven,  but  such  was  the  pressure  put  upon  them,  or 
their  anxiety  to  get  away,  that  not  infrequently  "  a  val- 
uable farm  was  traded  for  an  old  wagon,  a  horse,  a 
yoke  of  oxen,  or  anything  that  would  furnish  them  with 
the  means  of  leaving."  To  take  advantage  of  the  ne- 
cessities of  a  people  so  situated,  even  when  their  misfor- 
tunes were  brought  about  by  their  own  misdeeds,  was 
certainly  bad  enough  :  but  what  adds  immeasurably  to 
the  shame  of  the  transaction  is  the  fact  that  there  are 

1  In  the  Succinct  History  the  numher  of  refugees  is  g'iv^en 
at  fifteen  thousand ;  Switzler.  on  the  other  hand,  p.  249,  tells  us 
that  "at  this  time  there  were  about  5,000  inhabitants  in  Caldwell 
county,  nearly  4,000  being  Mormons,  most  of  whom  went  to  Nau- 
voo,  Illinois." 


184  MISSOURI. 

grounds  for  believing  that  not  a  little  of  the  intolerance 
shown  on  this  occasion  may  have  been  due  to  a  desire 
on  the  part  of  the  Gentiles  to  get  possession  of  the  Mor- 
mons' land.  At  least,  this  is  the  not  unnatural  inference 
from  the  statement  made,  not  by  one  of  themselves,  but 
by  a  gentleman  who  has  enjoyed  exceptional  advantages 
for  acquainting  himself  with  the  facts  of  the  case,  and 
who  tells  us  that  "  in  many  instances  conveyances  of 
land  were  demanded  and  enforced  at  the  mouth  of  a 
pistol  or  rifle."  ^ 

With  the  leaders  who  were  held  for  trial  nothing  was 
ever  done,  though  they  were  indicted  for  treason,  mur- 
der, robbery,  arson,  resisting  legal  process,  and  almost 
all  the  other  crimes  known  to  the  calendar.  In  remov- 
ing them  to  Boone,  t^  which  county  they  had  obtained 
a  change  «f  venue, yoseph  Smith  escaped,  by  bribing 
the  guards]  say  the  Gentiles,  or,  possibly,  as  the  Mor- 
mons assert,  by  the  connivance  of  the  state  authorities. 
One  or  two  of  the  others  were  brought  to  trial,  and  after 
an  impartial  hearing,  in  which  they  were  defended  by 
General  Doniphan,  and  James  S.  Rollins  of  Boone, (they 
were  acquitted.,  In  view  of  this  decision,  the  prosecut- 
ing attorney  for  that  district  wisely  determined  to  dis- 
miss the  indictments  against  the  others,  and  at  the  Au- 
gust term  of  the  court,  1840,  they  were  discharged  from 
custody. 

Immediately  on  their  release  they  repaired  to  Hancock 
County,  Illinois,  where  the  other  refugees  from  Missouri 

1  Switzler,  in  the  Commonwealth  of  Missouri,  p.  249.  In  the 
Succinct  History  we  are  told  that  "  Several  hundred  persons  were 
driven  in  a  defenseless  condition  into  a  hollow  square  of  armed 
fiends,  and  compelled  to  sign  away  their  property  to  the  repub- 
lic of  Missouri,  to  defray  the  expenses  which  had  been  incurred 
in  committing  these  crimes." 


FROM  1S20   TO  1S44.  185 

had  already  established  themselves.  Here  they  were 
most  hospitably  received  as  their  co-religionists  had  al- 
ready been,  for  the  Saints  were  looked  upon  as  martyrs 
to  their  faith,  and  their  sufferings  had  excited  the  sym- 
pathy of  all,  even  of  those  who  knew  how  incomj^atible 
were  their  social,  political,  and  religious  ideas  and  cus- 
toms with  the  peace  and  welfare  of  the  community  in 
which  they  dwelt ;  but  even  here  their  stay  was  short. 
In  June,  1844,  less  than  four  years  after  their  expul- 
sion from  Missouri,  Joseph  Smith  and  Hyrum,  his 
brother,  prisoners  in  the  hands  of  the  law  at  Warsaw, 
Illinois,  were  shot  down  by  a  mob  ;  and  in  1846,  the 
last  of  the  Mormons  were  finally  driven  from  Illinois, 
under  circumstances  that  entailed  heavier  sacrifices  and 
more  suffering  than  had  attended  their  enforced  flight 
from  Missouri. 

Other  measures  there  were  of  more  or  less  importance 
which  called  for  settlement  during  this  most  eventful 
period,  and  were,  happily,  free  from  the  element  of  vio- 
lence that  characterized  the  treatment  of  Lovejoy  and 
the  Mormons.  Prominent  among  them  were  the  es- 
tablishment of  the  State  University,  at  Columbia,  and 
the  addition  to  the  State  of  the  triangle  situated  north 
of  the  Missouri,  between  that  river  and  a  continuation 
of  the  southern  half  of  the  western  boundary  line  to  the 
northern  limits  of  the  State.  This  region  is  popularly 
known  as  the  Platte  Purchase.  It  contains  an  area 
about  equal  in  extent  to  that  of  Delaware,  is  of  excep- 
tional fertility,  and  has  since  been  divided  into  six  coun- 
ties, one  of  which,  Buchanan,  is  among  the  wealthiest 
and  most  populous  in  the  State.  In  1832,  when  the 
legislature  first  took  definite  action  for  the  acquisition 
of  this  region,  it  belonged  to  the  Sacs  and  Foxes,  to 


186  MISSOURI. 

whom  it  had  been  granted  in  exchange  for  their  posses- 
sions further  to  the  eastward  ;  and  hence  before  the  pro- 
posed measure  could  be  carried  out,  it  became  necessary 
to  abrogate  the  treaty  with  those  tribes,  —  no  very  diffi- 
cult matter  so  far  as  they  were  concerned  and  as  such 
affairs  were  usually  managed.  But  besides  this  ob- 
stacle it  involved  a  violation  of  the  Missouri  Compro- 
mise, as  the  whole  of  the  coveted  territory  lay  to  the 
north  of  the  line  of  thirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  min- 
utes ;  and  this,  it  would  seem,  ought  to  have  been  a  more 
serious  consideration.  Fortunately  just  at  this  time  and 
for  a  satisfactory  reason,  it  was  not  as  important  for 
the  North  to  insist  upon  the  sacredness  of  that  com- 
jjact  as  it  afterwards  became  ;  and  consequently  in  1836 
a  bill  making  this  addition  to  the  State  was  passed 
through  Congress  without  causing  so  much  as  a  ripple 
of  excitement.  Under  its  terms  a  treaty  was  made  with 
these  Indians  by  which  all  tliis  tract  was  relinquished  to 
the  whites,  and  in  1837  it  was  formally  annexed  to  the 
State.  In  speaking  of  the  legislation  by  which  this  was 
brought  about,  Colonel  Benton  ignored  his  own  services, 
and  in  his  large-hearted  way  was  in  the  habit  of  giving 
all  the  credit  of  the  measure  to  his  colleague,  Senator 
Lewis  F.  Linn.  He  also  bore  willing  testimony  to  the 
generosity  and  magnanimity  of  the  Northern  Congress- 
men, without  whose  aid  it  could  not  have  become  a  law. 
To  this  award  we  do  not  object,  though,  possibly,  our 
admiration  of  the  liberality  of  the  Northern  members 
may  be  tempered  by  the  reflection  that,  politically  speak- 
ing, this  concession  to  what  is  sometimes  styled  "  the 
slave  power  "  cost  them  nothing.  It  did  not  and  could 
not  add  to  the  voting  strength  of  the  South  in  the  Sen- 
ate, the  only  place  where  the  numerical  superiority  of 


FROM  1820   TO  1844.  187 

the  North  was  in  the  least  danger  ;  and  it  is  probably 
safe  to  say  that  the  representatives  from  that  section, 
in  permitting  the  bill  to  pass,  were  influenced  by  this 
consideration  quite  as  much  as  they  were  l)y  feelings  of 
generosity,  or  by  the  personal  popularity  of  Dr.  Linn, 
great  as  that  deservedly  was.  To  have  acted  otherwise 
would  have  been,  on  their  part,  a  useless  and  aggravat- 
ing exhibition  of  strength  on  a  point  which,  practically, 
could  neither  injure  them  nor  benefit  their  opponents  ; 
and  as  such  a  display  was  not  called  for,  either  as  a  mat- 
ter of  principle  or  policy,  they  wisely  kept  out  of  a  con- 
test in  which  they  had  nothing  to  gain.  Had  the  cir- 
cumstances been  changed  and  the  stake  been  worth  fight- 
ing for,  the  result  would  perhaps  have  been  different ; 
for  whatever  may  have  been  the  shortcomings  of  the 
Northern  members  of  Congress  in  other  respects,  they 
were  never  in  the  habit  of  wasting  their  strength  upon 
idle  issues,  nor  did  they  fall  into  the  error  of  mistaking 
the  shadow  for  the  substance  when  a  question  arose  in- 
volving the  possession  of  political  power. 

Turning  now  from  individual  business  troubles  and 
matters  of  purely  local  concern  to  subjects  of  national 
interest,  the  people  of  Missouri  and  of  the  country  at 
large  found  abundant  occupation  during  the  next  few 
years  in  dealing  Avith  questions  that  were  connected, 
directly  or  indirectly,  with  the  hard  times  of  1837. 
The  presidential  election  of  1840,  as  we  have  seen, 
turned  largely  upon  this  issue ;  and  though  the  Whigs 
were  successful  in  the  contest,  yet,  owing  to  the  death  of 
their  candidate  in  one  short  montli  after  his  inauguration, 
and  to  the  treachery,  as  they  termed  it,  of  Vice-Presi- 
dent Tyler,  who  succeeded  him,  they  failed  to  reap  the 
reward  of  their  hard-earned  victory.     Indeed,  if  we  ex- 


188  MISSOURI. 

cept  the  protective  tariff  of  1842,  of  which  he  approved, 
Mr.  Tyler,  in  his  administration  of  affairs,  may  be  said 
to  have  followed  the  policy  outlined  by  his  Democratic 
predecessor.  Not  only  was  this  true  of  the  financial 
legislation  of  this  period,  but  it  also  held  good  in  rela- 
tion to  the  management  of  foreign  affairs,  and  espe- 
cially in  regard  to  the  annexation  of  Texas  —  the  one 
measure  that  has  given  to  this  otherwise  uneventful 
administration  a  right  to  the  memorable  place  in  Amer- 
ican liistory  wliich  it  unquestionably  holds. 


CHAPTER  X. 

THE   ANNEXATION   OF   TEXAS   AND    THE    CONQUEST 
OF  NEW   aiEXICO. 

In  the  question  of  the  annexation  of  Texas,  the  peo- 
ple of  Missouri  were  deeply  interested ;  and  as  it  was 
the  immediate  cause  of  the  war  with  Mexico,  in  which 
they  jjlayed  a  most  important  part,  it  may  not  be  out  of 
place  to  take  a  rapid  glance  at  some  of  the  causes  that 
brought  it  about.  And  first  of  all  it  must  be  premised 
that  it  was  not  a  new  measure  broached  now  for  the 
first  time  and  as  the  result  of  a  deep  laid  conspiracy  for 
the  increase  of  slave  territory,  but  on  the  contrary,  it 
was  the  outcome  of  forces  which  were  perfectly  natural, 
wliich  are  constantly  at  work  among  all  strong,  coloniz- 
ing nations,  and  which  were  shared  to  a  very  great  ex- 
tent by  the  people  of  the  whole  country.  North  as  well 
as  South.  For  twenty  years,  in  fact  ever  since  John 
Quincy  Adams,  acting  under  the  instructions  of  Presi- 
dent Monroe,  but  in  opposition  to  his  own  better  judg- 
ment, had  concluded  the  treaty  by  which  all  the  vast 
tract  of  country,  now  known  as  Texas,  was  handed  over 
to  Spain  in  exchange  for  the  Floridas,  the  policy  of 
the  United  States,  it  mattered  not  which  political  party 
happened  to  be  in  the  ascendant,  had  been  to  recover 
it,  whenever  it  could  be  done  on  satisfactory  terms.  To 
this  end,  Adams,  on  more  than  one  occasion  during  the 
four  years  that  he  was  at  the  head  of  affairs,  endeavored 


190  MISSOURI. 

to  buy  it  back,  either  in  whole  or  in  part ;  and  later, 
Jackson  and  Van  Buren  both  made  ineffectual  efforts  in 
the  same  direction.  Nothing  daunted  by  these  repeated 
failures,  Tyler  took  up  the  good  work  ;  and  it  was  in 
1844,  during  the  closing  year  of  his  administration,  that 
a  treaty  of  annexation  was  made  with  Texas,  the  rejec- 
tion of  which  by  the  United  States  Senate  led  to  the 
adoption  of  a  joint  resolution  by  Congress  for  the  ad- 
mission of  that  State  into  the  Union  and  thus  paved  the 
way  to  the  Mexican  war. 

During  all  these  years,  affairs  in  the  Spanish  Ameri- 
can provinces  had  not  been  at  a  standstill.  In  1824, 
Mexico  revolted  from  Spain,  and  in  1836,  Texas,  follow- 
ing the  example  thus  set  her,  declared  herself  indepen- 
dent of  Mexico.  Of  tlie  causes  that  prompted  her  to 
this  course  it  is  not  my  place  to  speak.  All  that  it  con- 
cerns us  to  know  is  that  on  the  bloody  field  of  San 
Jacinto  she  showed,  beyond  the  possibility  of  a  doubt, 
that  she  was  abundantly  able  to  maintain  her  position, 
and  that  in  consequence  of  the  signal  victory  which 
she  gained  on  this  occasion  her  independence  was  recog- 
nized by  the  United  States.  This  action,  it  is  true,  has 
been  criticised  as  being  premature,  and  wanting  In 
comity  to  a  sister  republic,  but  it  was  in  accordance  with 
the  traditional  policy  of  the  government ;  and  its  pro- 
priety can  hardly  be  questioned  in  view  of  the  fact  that 
England  and  France  made  haste  to  do  the  same  thing, 
and  that  Mexico  was  never  in  a  position  to  reassert  her 
authority  over  any  portion  of  the  revolted  province  by 
force  of  arms  —  the  only  way  in  which  such  an  asser- 
tion could  have  been  made  effectual. 

Being  thus  left  to  herself,  with  her  independence 
acknowledged  by  three  of   the  leading  powers  of   the 


THE  ANNEXATION  OF   TEXAS.  191 

world,  and  with  no  enemy  strong  enough  to  dispute  her 
right  to  self-government,  it  was  certainly  competent  for 
Texas  to  enter  into  any  engagements  that  she  might 
think  conducive  to  her  future  vrelfare,  and  with  any 
power  with  which  she  might  see  fit  to  treat.  It  was 
a  matter  in  which  she  possessed  freedom  of  action  by 
virtue  of  her  jjosition  as  a  sovereign  State  ;  and  as  the 
United  States  had  recognized  her  right  to  this  position 
when  they  acknowledged  her  independence  in  1837,  it 
followed  necessarily  that  there  was  no  valid  reason, 
either  in  law  or  morals,  why  they  should  not  become  a 
party  to  any  such  treaty,  provided  they  chose  to  do  so. 
Accordingly,  when,  in  1844,  the  treaty  of  annexation 
came  before  the  Senate  of  the  United  States  for  ratifi- 
cation, the  question  to  be  decided  was  not  one  of  inter- 
national morality,  for  that  had  been  settled  some  seven 
years  before,  but  of  expediency,  and  of  this  they  were 
the  sole  judges.  In  other  words,  they  were  called  upon 
to  say  whether  the  acquisition  of  the  magnificent  empire 
which  they  were  then  offered  was  worth  the  war  which 
Mexico  had  foolishly  threatened  ^  in  the  event  of  its 
acceptance,  and  the  internal  struggle  and  consequent 
strain  upon  the  Union  which  the  acquisition  of  addi- 
tional slave  territory  would  inevitably  cause.  Other 
objections  there  may  have  been,  of  more  or  less  weight, 
but  these  were  the  chief,  and  it  may  be  added  that  they 
were   decisive,  for  in  April  of  this  year  the  treaty  was 

^  On  the  3d  of  November,  1843,  General  Almonte,  the  Mexican 
minister  in  Washington,  notified  the  state  department  that  if  the 
United  States  should  commit  the  "  inaudito  atentado "  of  ap- 
propriating to  themselves  an  integral  portion  of  the  Mexican 
territory,  lie  would  demand  his  passports,  and  his  country  would 
declare  war.  Bancroft,  History  of  the  Pacific  States,vol.  viii.  p. 
335.    San  Francisco,  1885. 


192  MISSOURI. 

rejected  by  a  vote  of  35  to  16,  a  number  of  those  who 
were  in  favor  of  annexation  voting  against  the  treaty 
on  account  of  certain  objectionable  features  which  it 
contained. 

This  action  of  the  Senate,  while  it  effectually  dis- 
posed of  this  particular  measure,  was  so  far  from 
putting  a  stop  to  the  agitation  for  the  acquisition  of 
Texas  that  it  merely  transferred  it  to  another  and  a 
larger  field.  It  now  became  the  principal  issue  in  the 
presidential  election  that  came  off  a  few  months  later ; 
and  it  was,  no  doubt,  the  position  of  seeming  hostility 
to  this  measure  which  Clay,  as  leader  of  the  Whigs,  was 
made  to  assume  that  led  to  his  defeat  and  the  suc- 
cess of  the  Democrats.  Instead  of  coming  out  openly 
in  favor  of  the  acquisition  of  this  region,  as  from  his 
course  in  1819,  and  again  in  1837,  it  was  to  have  been 
expected  that  he  would  do,  he  seems  to  have  been 
driven  by  the  logic  of  events  into  a  position  in  which  it 
became  necessary  to  sacrifice  something  of  his  freedom 
of  opinion  to  the  necessities  of  his  party,  and  to  what 
he  certainly  believed  to  be  the  good  of  the  country  at 
large.  Thus,  for  example,  when  questioned  as  to  his 
views  upon  this  subject,  he  answered  that,  "  so  far  from 
having  any  personal  objection  to  the  annexation  of 
Texas,  he  would  be  glad  to  see  it,  without  dishonor, 
without  war,  with  the  common  consent  of  the  Union, 
and  upon  just  and  fair  terms."  He  also  added  that  he 
did  not  think  that  ''  the  subject  of  slavery  ought  to  af- 
fect the  question  one  way  or  the  other."  That  he  was 
sincere  in  returning  this  Delphic  answer,  and  that  his 
course  was  dictated  by  praiseworthy  motives,  do  not 
admit  of  a  doubt.  As  an  abstract  proposition  he  would 
unquestionably   have   been  in    favor  of   annexation,    as 


TBE  ANNEXATION  OF  TEXAS.  193 

would  nine  tenths  of  the  people  of  his  State  and  of  the 
South  and  West  ;  hut  during  his  entire  career,  devotion 
to  the  Union  had  been  his  controlling-  principle  of  action, 
aiid  so  great  was  his  dread  of  the  consequences  that 
would  follow  the  acquisition  of  additional  slave  terri- 
tory that  he  was  betrayed  into  a  position  which  com- 
mitted him  to  nothing  delinite,  and  which,  perhaps  for 
this  very  i-eason,  weakened  him  in  the  South  and  West, 
whilst  it  failed  to  strengthen  him  in  the  North.  Polk,  on 
the  other  hand,  the  Democratic  candidate,  was  pledged 
to  immediate  annexation,  and  his  friends  wei'e  united 
and  aggressive.  They  knew  wliat  they  wanted,  and  as 
there  were  no  considerations  of  jiarty  jiolicy  to  qualify 
their  action,  they  were  at  liberty  to  work  for  it  deter- 
minedly and  with  enthusiasm.  In  the  end  they  were 
successful,  as  they  deserved  to  be,  whether  the  cause  for 
which  they  contended  be  judged  upon  its  merits,  or 
whether  we  sinq^ly  take  into  consideration  the  frankness 
with  which  they  avowed  their  purpose  and  the  energy 
with  which  they  carried  on  the  contest. 

In  this  election  the  j^eople  of  Missouri,  by  a  very 
decided  majority,  recorded  their  votes  in  favor  of  the 
policy  of  annexation  and  against  the  great  Kentuckian, 
though,  in  1824,  they  had  given  the  electoral  vote  of 
the  State  first  to  him,  and  then  to  the  younger  Adams, 
whose  election  was  thus  secured.  In  pursuing  this 
course  they  were  actuated  by  the  sentiment  of  national 
pride  which  finds  its  ex^jression  in  the  spread  of  Amer- 
ican ideas  and  institutions,  and  they  were  also  largely 
influenced  by  that  faith  in  themselves  and  in  the  future 
of  their  countiy  which  led  them  to  look  upon  it  as  the 
"  manifest  destiny  "  of  every  contiguous  bit  of  territory 
to  gravitate,  sooner  or  later,  into  the  Union.     These  sen- 


194  MISSOURI. 

timents  were  more  or  less  general,  and  though  by  a  sort 
of  poetic  license  they  are  sometimes  said  to  have  been 
due  to  the  Viking  blood  that  is  supposed  to  course 
through  the  veins  of  every  Anglo-American,  yet,  in  real- 
ity, under  the  less  attractive  name  of  a  passion  for  terri- 
torial aggrandizement,  they  are  common  to  every  grow- 
ing power,  to  whatever  race  it  may  belong.  They  are 
also  sufficient,  when  taken  in  connection  with  the  sym- 
pathy that  was  felt  for  the  cause  of  Texas  and  the 
horror  inspired  by  the  massacres  of  defenseless  prison- 
ers at  Goliad  and  the  Alamo,  to  account  for  the  move- 
ment on  the  part  of  the  people  of  the  Southwest  to  throw 
a  protecting  shield  over  their  weaker  neighbor,  without 
attributing  their  conduct  to  any  such  recondite  motive 
as  a  desire  to  increase  the  voting  strength  of  their  sec- 
tion by  the  acquisition  of  territory  which  might  be  ulti- 
mately cut  up  into  slave  States.  This  is,  no  doubt,  con- 
trary to  the  impression  that  has  been  assiduously  propa- 
gated, and  possibly,  in  regard  to  a  few  extremists  from 
the  far  South,  the  statement  may  not  hold  good,  but  with 
these  exceptions  it  is  believed  to  be  substantially  true. 
Certainly,  so  far  as  the  people  of  Missouri  were  con- 
cerned, the  extension  of  the  slave  area  was  so  little 
thought  of  at  this  time  that  but  for  the  prominence 
given  to  it  by  the  opponents  of  annexation,  it  would  not 
have  entered  into  their  calculations.  Upon  this  point 
there  is  not  room  for  an  argument.  The  recollection  of 
the  fierce  struggle  that  had  attended  the  admission  of 
Missouri  into  the  Union,  not  less  than  the  necessities  of 
her  position  on  the  border  line  between  freedom  and 
slavery,  had  inspired  her  people  with  a  healthy  spirit  of 
conservatism  ;  and  although  they  had  very  decided  ideas 
as  to  the   propriety  and   expediency   of  "  recovering " 


THE  ANNEXATION  OF   TEXAS.  195 

Texas,  yet  they  were  not  prepared  to  do  so  in  the  inter- 
est or  at  the  behest  of  the  so-called  slave  power,  if  by 
so  doing  they  were  to  endanger  the  stability  of  the 
Union.  This  position  they  made  manifest  in  a  series  of 
resolutions,  which  was  adojited  by  the  legislature  for  the 
guidance  of  their  members  of  Congress,  and  which  was 
laid  before  the  Senate  at  Washington,  in  February,  1845. 
In  it,  they  express  the  ojiinion  that  the  decision  of  the 
question  as  to  the  existence  of  slavery  "  ought  to  be  left 
to  the  people  who  now,  or  may  hereafter,  occupy  the 
territory  that  may  be  annexed  ;"  but  at  the  same  time 
they  declare  that  "  so  essential  do  they  regard  the  an- 
nexation of  Texas  to  the  interests  of  the  State  and  of 
the  United  States  that,  rather  than  fail  in  the  consum- 
mation of  this  object,  they  will  consent  to  such  just  and 
reasonable  compromises  ...  as  may  be  indispensably 
necessary  to  secure  the  accomplishment  of  the  measure 
and  preserve  the  peace  and  harmony  of  the  Union." 
In  sentiments  like  these  all  true  patriots  can  unite,  and 
it  would  have  been  well  for  the  peace  of  the  country  if 
they  had  been  more  general.  They  indicate  a  proper 
appreciation  of  the  principle  of  concession  which  is 
necessary  to  the  success  of  representative  government, 
and  they  breathe  a  spirit  of  moderation  and  loyalty  that 
is  in  refreshing  contrast  to  the  threats  of  disunion  in 
which  at  this  time,  Massachusetts,  not  less  than  South 
Carolina,  so  freely  indulged,  provided  their  respective 
ideas  were  not  carried  out. 

But  besides  the  desire  for  territorial  increase  and  the 
interest  which  they,  not  unnaturally,  felt  in  the  effort 
of  their  neighbors  to  maintain  their  independence,  the 
peojjle  of  Missouri  were  closely  connected  with  those  of 
Texas  by  ties  of  blood  ;  and  it  was  the  fact  of  this  kin- 


196  MISSOURI. 

ship,  the  actual  personal  interest  whicli  it  gave  them 
in  the  individual  well-being  of  their  friends  and  relatives 
over  the  border,  that  largely  influenced  their  action  at 
this  time,  just  as  during  the  earlier  years  of  the  struggle 
with  Mexico  it  had  led  them  to  make  the  cause  of  Texas 
their  own.  To  understand  how  this  close  relationship 
had  grown  up,  it  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind  that  soon 
after  the  treaty  which  gave  Spain  the  undisputed  posses- 
sion of  all  this  region,  emigration  began  to  flow  into  it 
from  Missouri.  The  stream  was  never,  perhaps,  very 
strong,  at  least  not  when  compared  with  the  current  of 
population  that  poured  into  the  older  State,  but  it  was 
steady,  and  for  twenty  years  or  more  it  rolled  in  without 
let  or  hindrance.  At  first,  these  emigrants  were  drawn 
thither  by  the  boundless  "  range  "  which  the  plains  of 
Texas  promised  ;  and  it  may  well  be  that  not  a  few  of 
them,  as  for  instance  the  Austins,  Browns,  and  others, 
were  attracted  by  the  stories  with  which  they  must  have 
been  familiar  of  "  the  happy  days  "  when,  under  Spanish 
rule,  land  could  be  had  for  the  asking  and  taxes  were  un- 
known. At  all  events,  similar  inducements  had  brought 
their  fathers  across  the  Mississippi  into  what  was  then 
Spanish  Louisiana ;  and  as  they  are  quite  sufficient  to 
account  for  the  desire  which,  we  are  told,^  prevailed 
among  the  Missourians  of  that  day  to  emigrate  to  Texas, 
it  will  not  be  necessary  to  seek  further  for  the  explana- 
tion of  a  movement  which  any  one  familiar  with  border 
life  will  recognize  as  being  perfectly  natural. 

^  "  It  is  curious  to  observe  with  how  much  ardor  they  recur  to 
the  recollection  of  those  happy  days.  And  these  recollections  are 
the  cause  that  those  peoj)le  and  their  descendants  have  still  a 
strong  predilection  for  the  French  and  Spanish  governments,  and 
one  great  reason  of  their  wish  to  emigrate  to  Texas."  — Flint's 
Travels,  p.  209.     Boston,  1826. 


THE  ANNEXATION   OF   TEXAS.  197 

Some  ten  or  fifteen  years  later,  after  the  Texan  struggle 
for  independence  had  been  begun  and  when  it  became 
evident  that  Mexico  intended,  if  possible,  to  crush  the 
movement  by  force  of  arms,  a  new  and  important  ele- 
ment was  introduced  into  the  contest.  The  sympathy 
which  the  people  of  Missouri  and  the  Southwest  felt 
for  their  friends  and  relatives  in  Texas,  and  which  had 
hitherto  been  theoretical  rather  than  personal,  now  lost 
its  passive  character  and  became  at  once  an  active  mov- 
ing force.  They  could  not  look  ujion  the  peo2)le  of  Texas 
as  strangers  and  foreigners,  and  it  was  impossible  to  sit 
quietly  by  and  see  them  engaged  in  what  appeared  to  be 
a  hopeless  struggle  with  a  peo2)le  of  alien  race.  Accord- 
ingly when,  in  her  hour  of  need,  a  cry  went  up  from 
Texas  for  aid,  it  met  vsdth  a  quick  and  effectual  response. 
"  Blood  "  proved  to  be  "  thicker  than  water,"  and  the 
recognition  of  this  fact  led,  as  it  must  always  do  with  a 
people  in  whom  the  race  feeling  is  as  strong  as  it  is 
among  the  Anglo-Americans,  to  results  that  can  hardly 
be  justified  under  the  law  of  nations.  International 
boundaries  were  overstepped  as  if  they  had  been  obso- 
lete lines  ;  neutrality  proclamations  and  hostile  mani- 
festoes were  treated  as  so  much  w^aste  paper,  and,  in 
short,  the  emigrant  now  moved  with  a  musket  in  his 
hands  instead  of  a  plough.  In  company  with  their 
neighbors  the  people  of  Missouri  had  taken  the  matter 
into  their  own  hands,  and  as  individuals  they  did  not 
hesitate  to  do  that  which  was  interdicted  to  them  as  a 
State,  and  from  which  in  their  national  capacity  they 
would  probably  have  shrunk.  Of  the  number  of  them 
that  flocked  into  Texas  during  her  colonial  days  and  in 
the  anxious  years  that  preceded  and  followed  her  dec- 
laration of  independence,  it  is  impossible  to  form  any- 


198  MISSOURI. 

thing  like  a  correct  idea,  but  it  is  probably  within  bounds 
to  assert  that  between  1822  and  1836  there  were  few 
prominent  Missouri  families  that  were  not  at  some  time 
rejjresented  in  the  life  of  the  new  State. 

Such  being  the  feeling  in  Missouri  when  the  question 
of  the  annexation  of  Texas  became  a  living  issue,  the 
result  could  not  long  be  doubtful.  Annexation  was 
carried  by  a  majority  of  ten  thousand  against  the  strong- 
est candidate  the  Whigs  could  put  up,  and  it  would  have 
been  larger,  had  it  not  been  for  the  well-settled  belief 
that  Clay  was  at  heart  as  much  in  favor  of  the  measure 
as  was  his  Democratic  opponent,  and  that  really  the  only 
difference  between  them  on  this  point  was  in  the  way  in 
which  they  expected  and  desired  to  see  it  accomplished. 
That  this  belief  was  not  without  a  solid  foundation  was 
shown  by  the  action  of  Congress,  which  met  in  December, 
1844,  hard  on  the  heels  of  the  presidential  election.  It 
was  the  same  body  that  had  rejected  the  treaty  of  an- 
nexation, and  yet,  at  this  session,  they  passed  a  joint 
resolution  which  accomplished  the  same  purpose  in  a  far 
more  summary  manner.  On  the  4th  of  July,  1845,  Texas 
acceded  to  the  terms  offered  her,  and  in  the  December 
following  she  was  formally  admitted  into  the  Union  by 
an  overwhelming  vote,  over  two  thirds  of  the  members 
of  each  house  being  in  favor  of  the  measure. 

A  few  days  after  the  adoption  of  the  joint  resolution, 
in  March,  1845,  General  Almonte,  the  Mexican  minister 
at  Washington,  closed  his  legation,  as  he  had  said  he 
would  do,  and  in  due  time  the  American  representative 
at  the  city  of  Mexico  received  his  passports.  This  was 
certainly  ominous,  but  President  Polk,  who  was  now  in 
power,  unwilling  to  abandon  all  hopes  of  peace,  proposed 
through  the  American  consul  to  send  an  envoy  to  Mexico, 


THE  ANNEXATION  OF   TEXAS.  199 

clothed  with  powers  to  settle  all  the  questions  that  were 
in  dispute  between  the  two  countries.  This  proposi- 
tion Avas  at  first  favorably  received,  and  John  Slidell 
was  sent  out  on  that  errand.  He  arrived  at  Vera 
Cruz  in  the  following  December,  only  to  find  that  the 
policy  of  the  Mexican  authorities  had  undergone  a 
change.  They  now  refused  to  receive  him,  and  in  so 
doing  they  effectually  shut  the  door  upon  all  prospects  of 
peace.  Soon  after,  on  the  24th  of  April,  1846,  General 
Arista,  the  Mexican  commander  on  the  Texas  border, 
notified  General  Taylor  that  he  considered  hostilities  to 
have  begun,  and  the  next  day  the  collision  took  place 
which  gave  occasion  to  the  declaration  on  the  part  of 
Congress  that  "  war  existed  by  the  act  of  Mexico." 

Whether  this  war  could  have  been  averted  by  the 
adoption  of  some  less  summary  method  of  annexation 
is  a  matter  that  may  well  be  doubted.  On  more  than 
one  occasion  Mexico  had  officially  declared  that  the  in- 
corporation of  Texas  into  the  United  States  would  be 
regarded  as  a  cause  of  war,  and  there  is  no  reason  for 
supposing  that  she  did  not  intend  to  abide  by  her  dec- 
laration. At  all  events  this  is  precisely  what  she  did  ; 
and,  whatever  may  have  been  the  provocation,  it  is  clear 
that  in  the  attack  which  her  troops  made  upon  Captain 
Thornton's  small  command  near  the  town  of  INIatamoras, 
but  on  the  east  side  of  the  Rio  Grande  and  therefore 
within  the  limits  claimed  by  Texas,  she  committed  the 
first  overt  act  of  the  war. 

When  the  news  of  this  skirmish  reached  New  Orleans, 
General  E.  P.  Gaines,  a  veteran  of  the  war  of  1812,  who 
was  in  command  of  that  military  department,  became 
alarmed  for  the  safety  of  General  Taylor's  army  and 
made  a  requisition  upon  several  of  the  neighboring  States 


200  MISSOURf. 

for  volunteers,  in  addition  to  the  four  regiments  asked 
for  by  Taylor  himself  from  Texas  and  Louisiana  respec- 
tively. IVlissouri  was  one  of  the  States  thus  called  upon, 
and  so  prompt  was  her  response  that,  in  two  weeks  from 
the  receipt  of  the  governor's  order  in  St.  Louis,  a  regi- 
ment six  hundred  and  fifty  strong  was  on  its  way  to  the 
seat  of  war.  They  did  not  remain  long  in  the  field,  nor 
did  they  see  any  actual  service ;  for  General  Gaines' 
course  was  disavowed  at  Washington,  and  as  the  troops 
raised  under  liis  call,  owing  to  the  short  time  for  which 
they  were  enlisted,  were  an  embarrassment  rather  than 
an  assistance,  they  were  disbanded  and  sent  home  at 
the  end  of  three  months. 

With  the  return  of  this  regiment  and  its  discharge 
from  the  service,  Missouri's  part  in  the  military  opera- 
tions along  this  portion  of  the  frontier  was  brought  to  a 
close.  Her  troops  were  needed  in  another  field,  and  to 
this  end  they  were  ordered  to  rendezvous  at  Fort  Leaven- 
worth, a  government  post  on  the  western  border  of  the 
State,  where  a  force  was  being  assembled  preparatory  to 
a  march  on  New  Mexico  and  California.  This  little 
band,  known  by  the  pretentious  name  of  the  "  Army  of 
the  West,"  consisted  of  one  regiment  of  horse,  one  bat- 
talion of  infantry  ami  one  of  artillery,  all  volunteers, 
with  six  companies  —  about  three  himdred  —  of  the  fii'st 
(regular)  dragoons,  the  whole  amounting  to  some  sixteen 
hundred  and  fifty  men.  With  the  exception  of  the  reg- 
ulars all  of  these  troops  were  from  Missouri,  their  com- 
mander, Colonel,  afterwards  General  Kearney,  himself, 
being  a  citizen  of  the  State.  La  the  latter  part  of  June, 
1846,  they  set  out  from  Fort  Leavenworth,  and  taking  the 
well  known  "  Santa  F^  trail  "  they  reached  that  town  on 
the  18th  of  August,  having  made  the  journey  of  nine 


COXQC'EST   OF  NEW  MEXICO.  201 

hundred  miles  through  an  uninhabited  region  in  less  than 
fifty  days,  and  with  but  little  loss  in  men  or  animals, 
though  there  were  times  when  they  suffered  for  want  of 
water  and  from  a  scai-city  of  provisions.  Upon  their 
approach  Governor  Armijo  abandoned  the  place  and  re- 
treated southwards,  —  the  result,  it  is  said,  of  an  intrigue 
in  which  he  and  Don  Diego  Archuleta,  his  second  in  com- 
mand, were  bribed,  —  so  that  when  the  Americans  ar- 
rived before  the  town  they  had  nothing  to  do  but  to 
enter  and  take  possession.  This  they  did,  "  without  fir- 
ing a  gun  or  shedding  a  drop  of  blood." 

Compared  with  the  storming  of  Monterey  or  the  cap- 
ture of  the  city  of  Mexico,  the  unresisted  occupation  of 
this  village  can  hardly  be  called  a  brilliant  achievement ; 
and  yet  in  the  end  it  led  to  results  that  have  proved  to 
be  quite  as  momentous,  and  far  more  permanent,  than 
any  that  followed  those  successes,  signal  as  they  were. 
At  that  date  Santa  Fe  proper  contained  a  population  of 
about  three  thousand  souls,  who  lived  in  badly  furnished 
houses,  built  of  adobe,  in  the  usual  New  Mexican  fashion, 
and  only  one  story  high.  Poor  and  mean  as  the  village 
was,  it  had  a  certain  importance,  growing  out  of  the  cir- 
cumstance that  for  twenty  years  or  more  it  had  been 
the  etttrepot  of  the  overland  trade  with  Missouri,  and  a 
sort  of  distributing  point  for  all  the  goods  imported  into 
this  and  the  neighboring  de^iartments  of  northern 
Mexico.  From  a  small  beginning  in  1822  this  trade 
had  gone  on,  increasing  year  by  year,  until  in  1843  it 
was  estimated  at  four  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dol- 
lars, necessitating  the  employment  of  two  hundred  and 
thirty  wagons  and  three  hundred  and  fifty  men.  Even 
in  1845,  after  the 'adoption  of  the  joint  resolution  for 
the  annexation  of  Texas,  and  when  the  relations  between 


202  MISSOURI. 

the  United  States  and  Mexico  were  consequently  in  a 
high  state  of  tension,  the  value  of  the  goods  brought 
into  Santa  Fe  over  this  route  is  said  to  have  been  about 
three  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  dollars ;  and  it  is  a 
curious  fact,  indicative  perhaps  of  the  sentiments  with 
which  the  merchants,  native  as  well  as  foreign,  regarded 
the  occupation  of  this  department,  that  there  was  at 
this  time  a  large  caravan  of  traders'  wagons,  following 
in  the  wake  of  the  American  troops. 

Aside  from  the  importance  which  this  place  possessed 
as  a  port  of  entry,  it  was  the  political  capital  of  the 
department,  which  is  divided  into  two  parts  by  the  Rio 
Grande.  It  was  also  situated  some  miles  to  the  eastward 
of  this  stream  and  therefore  within  the  limits  claimed  by 
Texas,  though  in  justice  it  must  be  admitted  that  she 
had  never  been  able  to  extend  her  sway  thus  far,  the 
effort  which  she  made  in  1841  to  do  so  having  resulted 
in  a  disastrous  failure. 

On  the  day  after  he  took  possession  of  Santa  Fe, 
General  Kearney  issued  a  proclamation,  in  which,  among 
other  things,  he  absolved  the  people  of  New  Mexico  from 
all  allegiance  to  their  constituted  authorities,  and  by  a 
stroke  of  the  pen  transformed  them  into  citizens  of  the 
United  States.  This  was  certainly  a  very  high-handed 
measure  ;  but  it  were  easily  defended,  if,  as  was  the  case 
with  the  proclamation  issued  August  2d  from  Bent's 
Fort,  its  effect  had  been  limited  to  so  much  of  the  de- 
partment as  was  situated  east  of  the  Del  Norte,  as  the 
Rio  Grande  is  here  called,  though  the  ultimate  own- 
ership of  the  tract  would  have  depended  upon  the  fate 
of  the  war.  General  Kearney,  however,  was  not  dis- 
posed to  wait  upon  the  slow  march  of  military  events, 
nor  did  he  have  the  slightest  intention  of  abandoning 


CONQUEST   OF  NEW  MEXICO.  203 

one  foot  of  the  territory  upon  which  he  had  seized.  So 
far  was  he  from  it  that  on  the  22d  of  August,  only 
three  days  after  the  officials  at  Santa  Fe  Iiad  been 
required  to  take  the  oath  of  allegiance  to  the  United 
States,  he  announced  his  purpose  of  holding  the  en- 
tire department  "  with  its  original  boundaries  (on  both 
sides  of  the  Del  Norte)  ;  "  and  as  if  to  to  leave  no  doubt 
as  to  his  intentions,  he  caused  a  constitution  and  code 
of  laws  to  be  prepared  which  changed  New  Mexico,  in 
name  and  in  fact,  from  a  province  of  Mexico  into  a 
territoiy  of  the  United  States. 

In  seeking  for  the  authority  under  which  Kearney 
acted  in  making  these  radical  changes,  we  are  obliged 
to  fall  back  upon  the  confidential  instructions  sent  him 
June  3,  1846,  though,  carefully  worded  and  elastic  as 
they  are,  they  can  hardly  be  said  to  justify  his  course. 
Unquestionably,  they  authorize  him  to  take  possession 
of  New  Mexico  and  "  establish  a  temporary  civil  govern- 
ment therein  ;  "  and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  they 
also  require  him  to  assure  the  people  of  this  province 
that  "  it  is  the  wish  and  design  of  the  United  States  to 
provide  for  them  a  free  government  .  .  .  similar  to  that 
which  exists  in  our  territories ;  "  but  beyond  this  they 
do  not  go.  Nowhere,  not  even  by  implication,  do  they 
confer  upon  him  the  power  to  annex  this  or  any  other 
region  that  he  might  conquer.  Indeed,  it  could  not  well 
have  been  otherwise,  for  this  was  a  power  which  the 
President  himself  did  not  possess,  and  which,  conse- 
quently, he  could  not  delegate  to  another.  But  whilst 
this  is  clear,  it  is  difficult  to  believe  that  Kearney,  sol- 
dier that  he  was  and  therefore  accustomed  to  obey  or- 
ders, would,  in  a  matter  of  this  importance,  have  taken 
the  responsibility  of  acting  as  he  did,  unless  he  had  been 


204  MISSOURI. 

assured  of  sympathy  and  support  from  Washington.  Of 
course,  this  is  conjecture  and  must  be  taken  for  what  it 
is  worth,  though  it  is  but  fair  to  add  that  it  receives  a 
certain  amount  of  confirmation  from  the  fact  that  Pres- 
ident Polk,  when  communicating  the  account  of  these 
proceedings  to  Congress,  refers  to  what,  he  says,  may 
have  been  "  the  exercise  of  an  excess  of  power,"  and  ex- 
cuses it  on  the  ground  that  it  was  "  the  offspring  of  a 
patriotic  desire  to  give  to  the  inhabitants  the  privileges 
and  immunities  so  cherished  by  the  people  of  our  own 
country." 

However,  let  the  responsibility  for  this  wholesale  seiz- 
ure of  foreign  territory  be  where  it  may,  it  is  very  evi- 
dent that  Kearney  was  never  troubled  by  any  doubts  as 
to  what  was  required  of  him.  On  the  contrary,  he  always 
moved  resolutely,  without  hesitation,  and  as  if  sure  of  his 
ground.  When  the  constitution  and  laws,  the  prepa- 
ration of  which  had  been  committed  to  Colonel  Doni- 
phan and  Private  W.  P.  Hall,  of  the  Missouri  volunteers, 
were  submitted  to  him,  he  at  once  ordered  them  to  be 
promulgated  and  obeyed  ;  and  on  the  very  same  day  he 
completed  the  civil  organization  of  the  territory  by  the 
appointment  of  another  Missourian,  Charles  Bent,  of 
Bent's  Fort,  as  governor,  with  a  full  complement  of 
judges  and  other  officials,  among  whom  we  recognize 
the  well-known  name  of  Francis  P.  Blair,  Jr.,  as  attorney 
general.  Having  thus  set  the  wheels  of  government  in 
motion,  he  felt  that  his  work  in  New  Mexico  was  done, 
and  on  the  2oth  of  September,  but  little  more  than  a 
month  from  the  date  of  his  arrival  at  Santa  Fe,  he  set 
out  for  California. 

On  the  26th,  the  day  after  his  departure.  Colonel 
Sterling  Price,  of  the  2d  Missouri  mounted  volunteers, 


CONQUEST  OF  NEW  MEXICO.  205 

arrived  in  Santa  Fe  and  relieved  Colonel-  Doniphan, 
who  began  to  prepare  for  his  march  on  Chihuahua, 
where  it  was  supposed  he  would  find  General  Wool,  to 
whom  he  had  been  ordered  to  report.  Before  he  was 
ready  to  move,  the  Navajo  Indians  had  become  so 
troublesome  that  an  order  was  sent  back  by  General 
Kearney,  directing  him  to  march  against  them  and  put 
a  stop  to  their  depredations.  Dividing  his  command, 
he  sent  a  column  under  Major  Gilpin  up  the  Chama 
and  across  the  mountains  into  the  valley  of  the  little 
Colorado ;  with  another  he  marched  up  the  valley  of 
the  Puerco ;  while  a  third  party,  numbering  only  thirty 
men,  under  command  of  Captain  John  W.  Reid,  took  a 
middle  route  and  thus  penetrated  into  the  very  heart  of 
the  Indian  country.  By  means  of  these  several  expedi- 
tions all  the  different  bands  of  the  Navajos  were  visited, 
and  it  resulted  in  bringing  a  large  number  of  their  chiefs 
and  warriors  to  the  Ojo  del  Oso,  —  Bear  Spring,  —  a  well- 
known  watering-place  sixty  miles  northwest  of  Zuni 
and  not  far  from  the  Moqui  villages.  Here  the  coun- 
cil was  held  and  peace  was  finally  concluded,  though 
Colonel  Doniphan  seems  to  have  had  some  difficulty  in 
making  the  Navajos  understand  how  it  was  that  he  now 
appeared  as  the  defender  of  the  people  whom  he  had 
come  out  to  fight.  Thus,  when  the  Navajos  were  told 
that  they  would  no  longer  be  permitted  to  continue  their 
hostile  incursions  into  the  territory,  one  of  their  chiefs 
is  said  to  have  answered :  "  Americans,  you  have  a 
strange  cause  of  war  against  the  Navajos.  We  have 
waged  war  against  the  New  Mexicans  for  several  years. 
AVe  have  plundered  their  villages,  and  killed  many  of 
their  people,  and  made  many  prisoners.  We  had  just 
cause  for  all  this.     You  have  lately  commenced  a  war 


206  MISSOURI. 

against  the  same  people.  You  are  powerful.  You  have 
great  guns  and  many  brave  soldiers.  You  have  there- 
fore conquered  them,  the  very  thing  we  have  been  at- 
tempting to  do  for  so  many  years.  You  now  turn  upon 
us  for  attempting  to  do  what  you  have  done  yourselves. 
We  cannot  see  why  you  have  cause  of  quarrel  with  us 
for  fighting  the  New  Mexicans  on  the  west,  while  you 
do  the  same  thing  on  the  east.  Look  how  matters  stand. 
This  is  our  war.  We  have  more  right  to  complain  of 
you  for  interfering  in  our  war,  than  you  have  to  quarrel 
with  us  for  continuing  a  war  we  had  begun  long  before 
you  got  here.  If  you  will  act  justly,  you  will  allow  us 
to  settle  our  own  differences." 

In  reply  to  this  statement,  which  is  not  without  its 
force.  Colonel  Doniphan  explained  that  the  "  New 
Mexicans  had  surrendered  ;  that  the  whole  country  and 
everything  in  it  had  become  ours  ;  that  when  the  In- 
dians now  stole  property  from  the  New  Mexicans  they 
were  stealing  from  us  ;  and  that  when  they  killed  them 
they  were  killing  our  people,  and  that  this  could  not  be 
suffered  any  longer."  Satisfied  with  this  explanation, 
or,  as  is  far  more  probable,  intimidated  by  the  display 
of  force  and  the  energy  with  which  the  Americans  had 
followed  them  over  snow -covered  regions  into  their 
mountain  fastnesses,  the  Navajos  agreed  to  a  treaty  of 
peace,  which,  by  a  special  article,  was  made  to  include 
the  New  Mexicans  and  also  the  Pueblo  Indians. 

Having  arranged  this  matter  satisfactorily,  Colonel 
Doniphan  was  now  at  liberty  to  take  up  his  line  of 
march  for  Chihuahua,  and,  accordingly,  he  retraced  his 
steps  to  the  valley  of  the  Del  Norte,  where  he  established 
his  headquarters  at  the  town  of  Valverde,  which  had  been 
made  the  depot  for  his  supplies  and  the  rendezvous  for 


CONQUEST   OF  NEW  MEXICO.  207 

the  different  detachments  of  his  regiment.  Here  the 
■weary  soldiers  were  allowed  a  few  days  of  rest,  before 
they  were  called  upon  to  start  on  that  long  and  toilsome 
march  which,  beginning  with  Chihuahua  as  the  objective 
point,  only  ended  on  the  shores  of  the  Mexican  gulf- 
On  the  14th  of  December,  all  things  being  in  readiness, 
the  first  battalion,  consisting  of  three  hundred  men  under 
Major  Gilpin,  set  out,  the  regiment  moving  in  separate 
divisions  for  the  convenience  of  crossing  the  Jornada  del 
muerto,  a  sandy  waste  of  ninety  miles,  without  wood  or 
water.  On  the  16th  Lieutenant  Colonel  Jackson  fol- 
lowed with  two  hundred  men,  and  on  the  19th  Doniphan 
brought  up  the  rear  with  the  rest  of  the  regiment,  the 
principal  part  of  the  baggage  train,  and  Lieutenant  Colo- 
nel Mitchell  and  ninety  men  of  the  2d  Missouri  —  Price's 
regiment.  A  hard  march  of  three  days  brought  them 
across  the  desert,  and  on  the  22d  the  command  was  con- 
centrated at  the  little  village  of  Donna  Ana,  where  they 
found  an  abundance  of  supplies  of  all  kinds,  with  streams 
of  running  water.  Continuing  their  journey  down  the 
valley,  they  came,  on  the  afternoon  of  the  2oth,  —  Christ- 
mas Day,  —  to  a  place  called  Bracito  ("  little  arm  "  of 
the  river),  where  they  pitched  their  camp  and  began  to 
make  themselves  comfortable  for  the  night.  Whilst  they 
were  scattered  about,  engaged  in  gathering  forage  for 
their  horses,  and  fuel  and  water  for  their  own  needs,  they 
were  attacked  by  a  superior  force  of  Mexicans,  nearly 
half  of  which  was  cavalry.  Rapidly  forming  on  foot, 
the  Americans  held  their  fire  until  the  enemy  came 
within  easy  range,  when  they  opened  upon  them  with 
destructive  effect.  At  the  same  time  Captain  Reid,  who 
had  succeeded  in  mounting  some  fifteen  or  twenty  of  his 
men,  broke  through  the  Mexican  ranks  and  threw  them 


208  MISSOURI. 

into  confusion.  In  less  than  half  an  hour  the  skirmish 
was  over  and  the  Mexicans  were  in  full  retreat,  "  leaving 
sixty-three  killed,  one  hundred  and  fifty  wounded,  and 
one  howitzer,  the  only  jiiece  of  artillery  in  the  engage- 
ment on  either  side."  The  loss  of  the  Americans  was 
eight  wounded,  none  killed. 

Resuming  their  march,  the  Americans  entered  El  Paso 
on  the  27th  without  opposition,  and  there  they  learned 
from  prisoners  and  others  of  the  change  that  had  heen 
made  in  General  Wool's  movements,  and  that  so  far 
from  being  in  possession  of  the  city  of  Chihuahua  he  had 
not  even  "  marched  upon  the  state."  This  was  not  very 
encouraging,  hut  Doniphan  determined  to  press  on, 
though  Chihuahua  was  still  two  hundred  and  twenty-five 
miles  distant,  and  not  a  little  of  the  route  lay  through  a 
desert  waste.  Under  the  circumstances,  he  did  not  think . 
it  prudent  to  adventure  further  without  artillery,  and 
he  ordered  down  from  Santa  Fe  Captain  Weightman's 
company,  with  a  battery  of  six  guns,  under  command  of 
Major  M.  L.  Clark. 

This  involved  a  delay  of  some  weeks,  but  the  8th  of 
February  found  him  once  more  on  the  march,  at  the 
head  of  nine  hundred  and  twenty-four  effective  men,  and 
singularly  enough  with  a  caravan  of  over  three  hundi'ed 
traders'  wagons,  which  he  was  supposed  to  be  escorting. 
On  the  28th,  at  the  pass  of  the  Sacramento,  fifteen  miles 
from  Chihuahua,  "  the  enemy  was  discovered  strongly 
posted  on  high  ground,  fortified  by  entrenchments  and 
well  supplied  with  artillery."  After  an  effective  cannon- 
ade. Colonel  Doniphan  advanced  to  the  attack  with  seven 
dismounted  companies  in  line  and  three  mounted  ;  but 
the  battle  was  decided  by  the  charge  of  two  twelve- 
pound    howitzers,  under  Cajitain  Weightman,  supported 


CON UU EST   OF  NEW  MEXICO.  209 

by  the  cavalry  and  followed  up  by  the  dismounted  troops 
and  the  rest  of  the  artillery.  In  this  charge  the  howitz- 
ers were  not  unlinibered  until  they  were  within  fifty  yards 
of  the  enemy's  redoubts,  and  the  cavalry  riding  up  to  the 
brink  of  the  entrenchments  drove  the  Mexican  gunners 
from  their  pieces.  Unable  to  withstand  this  onset,  the 
Mexicans  retreated,  closely  followed  by  the  Americans, 
until  night  put  an  end  to  the  conflict.  In  this  engage- 
ment the  Mexicans  had  about  four  thousand  men,  of 
whom  some  fifteen  hundred  were  rancheros,  badly  armed 
with  lassos,  lances,  and  macJietes  or  corn-knives,  and 
their  loss  is  given  at  three  hundred  killed,  as  many 
wounded,  and  forty  prisoners.  The  Americans,  as  has 
been  said,  had  nine  hundred  and  twenty-four  effective 
men,  to  which  number  must  be  added  two  companies  of 
teamsters,  under  Samuel  C.  Owens,  of  Missouri,  and  a 
few  amateur  soldiers,  which  carried  the  total  force  up  to 
eleven  hundred  and  sixty-four  men.  Of  this  number 
but  one,  Owens,  was  killed,  though  eleven  were  wounded, 
tliree  of  whom  subsequently  died. 

On  the  1st  of  March,  1847,  the  day  after  the  battle, 
Doniphan  took  possession  of  Chihuahua,  and  here  he  re- 
mained until  the  28th  of  April,  when,  in  obedience  to 
orders  from  General  Taylor,  he  set  out  for  Saltillo  and 
Matamoras,  nine  hundred  miles  distant,  but  not  until 
he  had  provided,  as  far  as  it  was  possible  to  do  so,  for 
the  safety  of  the  traders  whom  he  now  left  behind. 
The  march  to  Saltillo  was  a  hard  one  owing  to  the  want 
of  transportation  and  the  scarcity  of  water,  but  it  was 
successfully  accomplished,  and  would,  perhaps,  have 
passed  without  incident  had  it  not  been  for  the  severe 
punishment  which  Captain  Reid  and  a  detachment  of 
thirty-five  Americans  inflicted  ujion  a  marauding  band 


210  MISSOURI. 

of  Indians  at  the  request  o£  the  people  of  Parras,  and 
in  grateful  recognition  of  the  kindness  which  they  had 
shown  to  the  sick  of  General  Wool's  command.  Take 
it  all  in  all,  this  rescue  of  eighteen  Mexican  boys  and 
girls  from  a  caj^tivity  worse  than  death  by  a  party  of 
Missom-i  troopers  was  a  novel  and  pleasing  episode  ;  and 
as  it  was,  in  its  origin  and  ending,  as  creditable  to  the 
Mexicans  as  to  the  Americans,  and  was,  moreover,  a  fair 
illustration  of  Western  character,  it  is  here  given  in  the 
words  of  Jose  Ignacio  Arabe,  the  prefect  of  Parras. 
Under  date  of  May  18th  he  thus  addresses  Captain 
Reld  :  — 

"  At  the  first  notice  that  the  barbarians,  after  killing 
many  and  taking  captives,  were  returning  to  their  haunts, 
you  generously  and  bravely  offered  ...  to  fight  them 
on  their  crossing  by  the  Pozo,  executing  this  entei'prise 
with  celerity,  address,  and  bravery  worthy  of  all  eulogy, 
and  worthy  of  the  brilliant  issue  which  all  celebrate. 
You  recovered  many  animals  and  much  plundered  prop- 
erty, and  eighteen  captives  were  restored  to  liberty  and 
to  social  enjoyments,  their  souls  overflowing  with  a  lively 
sentiment  of  joy  and  gi-atitude  which  aU  the  inhabitants 
of  this  town  equally  breathe  in  favor  of  their  generous 
deliverers  and  their  valiant  chief.  The  half  of  the  In- 
dians killed  in  the  combat,  and  those  which  fly  wounded, 
do  not  calm  the  pain  which  all  feel  for  the  wound  which 
Your  Excellency  received  defending  Christians  and  civil- 
ized beings  against  the  rage  and  brutality  of  savages. 
All  desire  the  speedy  reestablishment  of  your  health, 
and  although  they  know  that  in  your  own  noble  soul  will 
be  found  the  best  reward  of  your  conduct,  they  desire 
also  to  address  you  the  expression  of  their  gratitude  and 
high  esteem.     I  am  honored  in  being:  the  orjjan  of  the 


CONQUEST   OF  NEW  MEXICO.  211 

public  sentiment,  and  pray  you  to  accept  it,  with  the  as- 
surance of  my  most  distinguished  esteem." 

On  the  22d  of  May  the  Missourians,  "  rough,  ragged, 
and  ready,"  reached  General  Wool's  lines  near  Saltillo  ; 
and  the  next  day,  as  the  term  of  their  enlistment  was 
rapidly  drawing  to  a  close  and  there  was  no  prospect  of 
further  need  of  their  services,  Captain  Weightman  turned 
over  the  battery  which  he  had  so  worthily  commanded 
to  the  officer  who  was  appointed  to  receive  it.  The  ten 
guns  which  had  been  captured  at  Sacramento  were,  by 
permission  of  General  Taylor,  conveyed  to  Missouri  and 
deposited  with  the  state  authorities  at  Jefferson  City, 
subject  to  the  action  of  the  War  Department  at  Wash- 
ington. 

Leaving  Saltillo,  the  Missourians  proceeded  by  rela- 
tively slow  and  easy  marches  to  Brazos  Island,  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Rio  Grande,  where  they  arrived  on  the  9th 
of  June  ;  and  the  following  day  they  embarked  for  New 
Orleans  and  home.  With  their  arrival  on  the  shores  of 
the  gulf  this  extraordinary  march  came  to  an  end.  In- 
cluding the  Navajo  expedition,  it  had  extended  over  a 
distance  of  three  thousand  miles,  through  an  uninhabited 
or  a  hostile  country,  often  without  water  or  supplies  of 
any  kind  ;  and  it  had  been  made  in  the  face  of  difficulties 
which  tested  to  the  utmost  the  endurance  of  those  who 
took  part  in  it.  That  they  were  able  to  accomplish  it 
with  a  loss  of  less  than  fifty  men,  counting  those  ^^  ho  fell 
in  the  sharply  contested  action  at  Sacramento,  speaks 
volumes  for  the  material  of  the  command,  and  justly 
entitled  them  to  the  enthusiastic  welcome  which  they  re- 
ceived on  their  return.  Considered,  however,  as  a  fac- 
tor in  the  military  problem,  assuming  this  to  have  been 
the  capture  of  the  city  of  Mexico,  the  work  performed 


212  MISSOURI. 

by  this  column  loses  much  of  its  importance,  owing  to 
the  adojjtion  of  the  route  by  way  of  Vera  Cruz  instead 
of  that  by  way  of  Zacatecas  and  San  Luis  Potosi,  over 
which  Taylor  had  proposed  to  advance  ;  but  if  we  esti- 
mate it  by  its  final  results,  we  shall  have  to  admit  that 
the  conquest  and  occupation  of  New  Mexico  simphfied 
the  task  of  the  American  commissioner  when  negotiating 
the  treaty  of  Guadalupe  Hidalgo,  and  made  it  possible 
for  him  so  to  perfect  the  title  to  the  territory  which  we 
then  gained  that,  compared  with  that  by  which  Germany 
now  holds  Alsace  and  Lorraine,  it  may  be  said  to  be 
without  a  flaw  either  in  law  or  morals. 

But  w^hilst  we  have  been  following  the  march  of 
Doniphan  and  his  men,  New  Mexico  was  the  scene 
of  a  bloody  uprising,  which  led  to  the  death  of  Gov- 
ernor Charles  Bent,  and  threatened  the  supremacy  of 
the  Americans.  Benton  tells  us  that  it  was  due  to  the 
machinations  of  a  certain  Diego  Archuleta,  the  second 
in  command  under  Governor  Armijo,  and  intimates 
that  Archuleta's  course  was  dictated  by  the  conviction 
that  he  had  been  cheated  in  the  intrigue  to  which  he 
is  said  to  have  been  a  party,  by  virtue  of  which  he 
was  to  have  been  permitted  to  make  himself  master  of 
so  much  of  the  province  as  lay  to  the  west  of  the  Rio 
Grande,  in  consideration  of  the  surrender  of  Santa  Fe 
to  the  Americans.  So  far  as  Archuleta  was  concerned 
this  may  well  have  been  true.  Certainly,  if  the  story 
of  the  intrigue  be  accepted,  and  if,  furthermore,  it  be 
admitted  that  he  was  led  to  believe  that  Magofiin,  who 
seems  to  have  been  the  tempter  in  this  case,  was  acting 
by  the  authority  of  the  United  States,  it  will  be  easy  to 
understand  why,  having  fulfilled  his  jjart  of  the  iniqui- 
tous bargain,  he  should  have  regarded  Kearney's  procla- 


CONUUKSr   OF  NFAV  MEXICO.  213 

mation  annexing  the  whole  of  New  Mexico  as  an  attempt 
to  get  rid  of  him  without  paying  him  for  his  services. 
But  even  if  all  this  were  true,  we  must  not  forget  that 
Archuleta  was  only  one  of  the  prime-movers  in  this  re- 
volt, and  apparently  not  the  ruling  spirit  among  them  ; 
and  base  and  sordid  as  may  have  been  the  motives 
that  governed  his  conduct,  there  is  not  the  slightest 
ground  for  supposing  that  the  co-conspirators  were  in- 
fluenced by  any  such  considerations.  Their  course  may 
have  been  dictated  by  high  patriotic  motives.  In  fact 
the  evidence  all  seems  to  point  that  way,  for  Colonel 
Price,  of  the  2d  Missouri,  who  was  left  in  command  of 
the  troops  stationed  in  the  territory,  writing  under  date 
of  July,  1847,  speaks  of  "  the  deadly  hostility  "  with 
which  the  New  Mexicans  regarded  the  Americans,  and 
it  is  not  probable  that  the  feeling  was  any  less  bitter  in 
the  months  immediately  succeeding  the  occupation,  or 
whilst  the  so-called  revolt  was  in  progress. 

Under  any  cii'cunistances  the  dismemberment  of  a 
nation  or  the  forcible  annexation  of  one  jjeople  by  an- 
other, especially  when  they  differ  in  race  and  religion,  is 
not  a  gentle  process  ;  and  when  it  is  attended,  as  was 
the  case  in  the  present  instance,  by  radical  changes  in 
their  mode  of  government  and  in  their  laws  and  cus- 
toms, it  inevitably  gives  rise  to  a  deep-seated  feeling  of 
hostility  which  may  be  suppressed  by  the  strong  hand, 
but  which  only  awaits  a  favorable  opportunity  to  burst 
forth  into  acts  of  ojjen,  and,  we  may  add,  justifiable  war- 
fare. When  an  outbreak  of  this  character  is  successful, 
or  if,  perchance,  the  story  be  told  of  ourselves,  the  move- 
ment is  always  ascribed  to  patriotic  ardor  ;  but  if,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  result  in  failure,  or  if  we  happen  to  be  the 
suffei'ers,  then  it  is  characterized  by  other  and  less  high- 


214  MISSOURI. 

sounding  terms.  In  a  struggle  of  this  kind,  the  losers, 
like  the  absent,  are  always  in  the  wrong,  and  such  seems 
to  have  been  the  case  with  the  New  Mexicans  in  the 
effort  which  they  made  to  throw  off  the  yoke  that  had 
been  imposed  on  them.  Evidently  they  had  never  ac- 
cepted the  situation,  and  although  the  conditions  were 
not  favorable  to  a  reenactment  on  this  distant  field  and 
at  this  late  day  of  the  "  Sicilian  Vespers,"  yet  they  gal- 
lantly made  the  attempt ;  and  but  for  the  jiromptness  of 
the  American  commander  in  attacking  the  insurrection- 
ary force  before  it  had  perfected  its  organization,  the 
result  might  have  been  different. 

According  to  the  vague  and  somewhat  incomplete  ac- 
counts that  have  come  down  to  us,  the  first  mutterings 
of  the  storm  were  heard  about  the  middle  of  December, 
only  four  months  after  the  occupation  of  Santa  Fe, 
during  which  period  the  plans  of  the  conspirators  had 
been  so  far  matured  that  the  25th  of  the  month,  the 
day  on  which  Doniphan  fought  the  skirmish  at  Bracito, 
was  chosen  for  the  uprising.  Colonel  Price,  however, 
had  i-eceived  an  intimation  of  the  impending  danger,  and 
he  at  once  took  measures  to  meet  and  counteract  it.  Sev- 
eral arrests  were  made,  and  for  the  time  being  the  prog- 
ress of  the  movement  seemed  to  have  been  checked. 
The  affair,  however,  had  gone  too  far  to  admit  of  any 
other  mode  of  settlement  than  by  an  appeal  to  the  sword, 
and  for  this  the  Americans  were  not  yet  prepared. 
Indeed  so  secure  did  they  feel  that  Governor  Bent, 
on  the  14th  of  January,  1847,  left  Santa  F^  on  a  visit 
to  his  family  at  Taos,  distant  about  seventy  miles ;  and 
here  he  was  when,  on  the  19th,  a  revolutionary  force  took 
possession  of  the  place,  and  murdered  him  and  several 
other    government  officials,  among  whom  was  Cornelio 


CONQUEST  OF  NEW  MEXICO.  215 

Vigil,  the  prefect,  a  native  of  New  Mexico.  Similar 
outbreaks  took  place  at  Arroyo  Hondo,  Mora,  and  other 
places  in  this  portion  of  the  territory,  during  which  a 
number  of  Americans,  and  of  those  who  were  suj^posed 
to  be  favorable  to  them,  lost  their  lives. 

The  news  of  the  uprising  at  Taos  and  the  murder  of 
Governor  Bent  was  brought  to  Colonel  Price  on  the 
day  after  it  occurred,  and  he  immediately  sent  orders 
to  Major  Edmonson  of  his  regiment,  at  Albuquerque,  to 
move  uji  to  Santa  Fe  and  take  command  there,  whilst 
he  himself  marched  against  the  insurgents,  who  were  re- 
ported to  be  advancing  and  rapidly  gaining  in  strength. 
On  the  23d,  he  set  out  at  the  head  of  only  three  hun- 
dred and  fifty  men,  consisting  in  great  part  of  the  dis- 
mounted troopers  of  his  own  regiment,  and  on  the  next 
day  he  encountered  the  enemy  near  the  village  of  Can- 
ada, where  they  were  posted  on  heights  commanding  the 
road,  and  in  some  strong  adobe  houses  at  the  foot  of  the 
hills.  After  a  sharp  skirmish,  in  which  the  brunt  of  the 
fight  seems  to  have  been  borne  by  Captain  Angney's 
battalion  of  (Missouri)  infantry,  and  St.  Train's  company 
of  volunteers  from  Santa  Fe,  the  enemy  were  driven 
from  every  position,  and  retreated,  leaving  thirty-six  of 
their  number  dead  on  the  field,  while  the  Americans  had 
to  lament  the  loss  of  two  killed  and  seven  wounded. 
Following  up  his  success.  Price  reached  Luceros  on  the 
28th,  where  he  was  joined  by  Captain  Burgwin,  with  one 
company  of  the  first  dragoons  and  a  six-pound  cannon. 
This  increased  the  number  of  his  available  men  to  four 
hundred  and  eighty,  and  with  this  force  he  marched  on 
Taos,  whither  the  enemy  fled  after  a  second  skirmish, 
which  took  place  at  Embudo.  After  a  hard  march  of 
several  days,  during  a  portion  of  which  the  snow  was 


216  MISSOURI. 

so  deep  that  the  soldiers  were  obliged  to  break  the  way 
for  the  artilleiy  and  baggage  wagons,  he  reached  the  vil- 
lage of  San  Fernando  de  Taos,  through  which  he  passed 
on  his  way  to  the  pueblo  of  the  same  name,  where  the 
insurgents  had  taken  refuge.  This  place  was  "  inclosed 
by  formidable  walls  and  strong  pickets,  within  which 
were  two  large  buildings  of  irregular  pyramidal  form, 
seven  or  eight  stories  in  height.  Besides  these  dwelling- 
houses,  each  capable  of  sheltering  five  or  six  hundred 
men,  there  was  a  large  church  situated  in  the  north- 
west angle  of  the  inclosure,  with  a  narrow  passage  be- 
tween it  and  the  outer  wall."  All  these  buildings  were 
of  adobe,  —  sun-dried  bricks,  —  and  it  was  no  doubt 
owing  to  this  fact,  to  the  thickness  of  these  walls,  and  to 
their  singularly  defensive  form,  pierced  as  they  were  for 
rifles,  that  the  besieged  were  able  to  resist,  during  the 
better  part  of  two  days,  an  attack  in  which  the  guns, 
under  Lieutenants  Dyer  (afterwards  chief  of  ordnance) 
and  Wilson,  were  served  at  unusually  short  range. 

Into  the  details  of  this  siege  we  do  not  proj)Ose  to 
enter,  though  some  idea  may  be  formed  of  the  difficulty 
of  the  undertaking  and  the  obstinacy  of  the  defense  from 
the  fact  that  at  eleven  o'clock  on  the  morning  of  the  sec- 
ond day,  Price,  finding  that  it  was  impossible  to  breach 
the  walls  of  the  church  with  his  cannon,  ordered  the  build- 
ing to  be  stormed.  At  a  given  signal  Captain  Burg- 
win,  Avith  his  own  company  and  one  of  the  2d  Missouri, 
"  charged  upon  the  western  flank  of  the  church  ;  "  while 
Captain  Angney,  with  his  battalion  of  infantry  and  an- 
other company  of  the  2d  Missouri,  attacked  the  northern 
wall.  As  soon  as  the  troops  under  Captain  Burgwin  had 
established  themselves  on  their  side  of  the  church,  they 
began   to  cut   their   way  through  the    wall   with  axes. 


CONQUEST   OF  NEW  MEXICO.  217 

After  some  hours  of  this  kind  of  work,  daring  which 
Capt.  Burgwin  was  mortally  wounded,  "  the  six-pounder 
was  run  up  within  sixty  yards  of  the  church,  and  after 
ten  rounds,  one  of  the  holes  which  had  been  cut  with 
axes  was  widened  into  a  practicable  breach."  Through 
this  the  stormers  entered,  and  the  building  was  carried 
without  further  resistance. 

This  virtually  put  an  end  to  the  conflict ;  for  the 
enemy,  in  their  haste  to  escape,  eitlier  fled  to  the  neigh- 
boring mountains,  or  took  refuge  in  the  large  communal 
houses  in  other  parts  of  the  village.  The  next  morning, 
in  answer  to  their  supplications,  Colonel  Price  agreed  to 
a  peace  on  condition  that  they  would  deliver  up  Tomas, 
one  of  their  leading  men,  who  was  said  to  have  been 
actively  engaged  in  the  murder  of  Governor  Bent.  This 
Avas  done,  and  Tomas  was  taken  to  San  Fernando  de 
Taos  and  confined  in  the  guard-house,  where  he  was 
shortly  afterwards  shot  by  a  private  soldier.  The  num- 
ber of  the  enemy,  Mexicans  and  Pueblo  Indians,  en- 
gaged in  this  battle  was  estimated  by  Colonel  Price  at 
between  six  and  seven  hundred,  of  whom  one  hundred 
and  fifty  were  reported  killed.  On  the  side  of  the  Ameri- 
cans the  loss  was  seven  killed  and  forty-five  wounded, 
many  of  whom  died. 

With  the  fall  of  this  pueblo  the  revolt  may  be  said  to 
have  been  brought  to  an  end.  Of  those  who  were 
prominently  concerned  in  it,  a  few  died  in  action,  while 
others,  among  whom  was  Archuleta,  took  time  by  the 
forelock  and  escaped.  Fifteen,  seven  of  whom  were 
Pueblo  Indians,  were  accused  of  treason,  —  a  crime  of 
which,  under  the  circumstances,  they  could  not  have 
been  guilty,  —  and  having  been  tried  and  convicted  by  a 
court  which  had  no  jurisdiction  in  the  matter,  they  were 


218  MISSOURI. 

promptly  executed.  This  was  but  little  better  than  a 
judicial  murder ;  and  that  such  was  the  opinion  of  the 
cabinet  at  Washington  is  evident  from  the  way  in 
which  President  Polk  treated  those  cases  that  were  rec- 
ommended to  him  for  mercy.  To  have  pardoned  them 
would  have  been  to  acknowledge  the  legality  of  the  sen- 
tence under  which  they  were  to  suffer,  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  to  have  refused  to  do  so  would  have  been 
to  make  himself,  in  a  measure,  responsible  for  the  out- 
rage upon  law  and  justice  by  which  they  were  con- 
demned ;  and  so.  If  we  may  trust  Benton's  account,  he 
solved  the  difficulty  by  instructing  the  authorities  in 
New  Mexico  quietly  to  turn  them  loose. 

Notwithstanding  the  severity  of  the  measures  taken 
for  the  suppression  of  the  uprising,  affairs  within  the 
territory  continued  for  some  months  to  be  in  a  very  un- 
settled condition,  and  intercourse  between  Santa  Fe  and 
Missouri  became  very  unsafe.  Trains  were  captured 
and  pillaged,  distant  grazing  camps  were  attacked  and 
the  animals  stampeded,  and  not  unfrequently  cases  of 
the  murder  of  isolated  parties  of  Americans  occurred. 
These  outrages,  it  is  true,  were  not  the  result  of  a  con- 
certed attempt  on  the  part  of  the  Mexicans  to  drive  out 
the  invaders,  but  were  the  work  of  individual  bands  of 
marauders,  red  as  well  as  white,  who  were  bent  on  rob- 
bery ;  and  although  the  perpetrators  when  caught  met 
with  a  short  shrift,  yet  they  were  so  numerous,  and  their 
depredations  so  daring,  that,  joined  to  the  rumors  of  an- 
other insurrection  and  of  the  approach  of  a  large  hostile 
force  from  the  South,  Colonel  Price  was  led,  in  the  let- 
ter to  which  we  have  already  referred,  to  ask  for  addi- 
tional troops  to  take  the  place  of  those  whose  terms  of 
service  were  about  to  expire. 


CONUUEST  OF  NEW  MEXICO.  219 

These  were  promptly  furnislied,  his  call  for  reinforce- 
ments having  heen  anticipated,  and  hy  autumn  the 
available  force  in  New  Mexico  was  raised  to  three  thou- 
sand men  by  the  arrival  of  fresh  regiments,  which, 
with  but  one  exception,  were  from  Missouri.  With  this 
force,  about  twice  as  large  as  that  which  had  originally 
taken  possession  of  the  province,  Colonel  or  as  he  must 
now  be  called  General  Price,  found  no  difficulty  in  restor- 
ing order  and  in  maintaining  the  advantages  which  had 
already  been  gained.  In  an  incredibly  short  time  the 
people  of  New  Mexico  submitted  to  the  situation,  and  the 
treaty  of  Guadalupe  Hidalgo,  concluded  in  February, 
1848,  so  far  from  effecting  any  change  in  their  condi- 
tion, merel)^  gave  a  legal  sanction  to  what  was  an  accom- 
plished fact.  New  Mexico  to  all  intents  and  purposes 
was  already  a  territory  of  the  United  States  ;  and  if  we 
except  the  few  companies  of  the  first  dragoons,  whose 
gallant  services  there  is  no  wish  to  disparage,  it  was 
made  so  by  Missouri  volunteers.  Of  the  seven  thousand 
men  whom  she  sent  to  the  war,  over  six  thousand  were 
employed  in  the  conquest  and  pacification  of  this  prov- 
ince ;  and  there  can  be  no  question  that  it  was  the  thor- 
oughness with  which  they  did  their  work  that  made  it 
relatively  an  easy  matter  for  the  Mexican  authorities  to 
part  with  all  this  region  in  return  for  the  very  handsome 
monetary  consideration  which  they  received. 


CHAPTER  XI. 

THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.     INTERNAL  IMPROVEMENTS. 
EDUCATION. 

The  acquisition  of  California  and  New  Mexico  was 
made  the  occasion  for  reviving  the  slavery  issue,  though 
it  assumed  a  different  form  from  that  which  it  had 
worn  in  1820,  when  the  adoption  of  the  Missouri  Com- 
promise put  a  stop,  temporarily,  to  the  agitation  of  tlie 
question.  At  that  time,  it  will  be  remembered,  slavery 
existed  in  all  the  territory  west  of  the  Mississippi 
owned  by  the  United  States  ;  and  the  effect  of  the  com- 
promise then  adopted  was  to  transform  the  northern 
portion  of  that  vast  region  from  possible  slave  to  actual 
free  territory.  Now  the  conditions  were  reversed. 
California  and  New  INIexico,  so  far  as  negro  slavery 
was  concerned,  were  free  —  made  so  by  the  law  of 
Mexico ;  and  to  extend  the  line  of  thirty-six  degrees 
and  thirty  minutes  north  latitude  through  them  and  on 
to  the  Pacific  Ocean,  as  the  Southern  representatives 
insisted  upon  doing,  was  to  transfer  the  southern  por- 
tions of  those  territories  from  actual  freedom  to  possible 
slavery.  In  other  words,  in  the  one  instance  slavery 
was  excluded  from  a  region  in  which  it  legally  existed, 
whilst  in  the  other  it  was  in  contemplation  to  make  it 
legally  possible  in  territories  where  it  had  been  pro- 
hibited by  the  laws  of  the  country  to  which  they  had  be- 
longed.    This    a   large    majority  of  the  people  of  the 


THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.  221 

North  were  anxious  to  prevent ;  and  to  this  end  they 
not  only  opjjosed  the  extension  of  the  line  of  the  Mis- 
souri Compromise  into  the  newly  acquired  territories, 
but  their  representatives  in  Washington  endeavored  so 
to  shape  the  action  of  Congress  as  to  prohibit,  by  legisla- 
tive enactments,  the  introduction  of  slavery  into  any  part 
of  this  region. 

To  all  such  legislation  the  people  of  Missouri  were 
opposed  ;  not  that  they  were  necessarily  in  favor  of 
the  extension  of  the  area  of  slavery,  but  for  the  reason 
that  they  either  did  not  believe  that  Congress  had  the 
power,  under  the  Constitution,  to  legislate  upon  the 
subject,  or  because,  admitting  that  Congress  had  the 
power,  they  did  not  deem  its  exercise  advisable,  believing 
as  they  did  that  the  people  of  a  territory,  when  framing 
their  State  Constitution,  ought  to  be  left  free  to  decide 
as  to  the  institutions  under  which  they  were  to  live. 
Upon  this  point  their  ideas  were  very  clear,  and  in 
January,  1849,  the  legislature  of  the  State  embodied 
them  in  a  series  of  resolutions  intended  for  the  guidance 
of  their  members  of  Congress.  In  local  history,  these 
resolutions  are  known  as  the  "  Jackson  resolutions  " 
from  the  fact  that  Governor  C.  F.  Jackson  was  chair- 
man of  the  committee  that  reported  them  ;  though  they 
were  introduced  into  the  Senate  by  Carty  Wells,  of 
Marion  County,  and  were  originally  drawn  up,  so  it  was 
said,  by  Judge  W.  B.  Napton,  of  the  supreme  court,  a 
learned  lawyer,  an  upright  judge,  and  a  most  estimable 
citizen. 

After  a  stormy  debate,  which  was  but  a  prelude  to 
the  heated  political  contest  that  was  to  follow,  the  entire 
series  was  adopted,  the  Whigs  opposing,  while  the 
Democrats,  who  had  a  large  majority  in  both  branches 


222  MISSOURI. 

of  the  General  Assembly,  were,  with  few  exceptions,  in 
favor  of  it.  Notwithstanding  the  almost  unanimous  vote 
which  they  had  given  to  these  resolutions,  the  Democrats 
soon  found  that  instead  of  being  a  bond  of  union  and  a 
source  of  strength,  they  were  a  cause  of  discord  and  an 
element  of  weakness.  Benton,  in  open  Senate,  refused 
to  be  bound  by  them  on  the  ground  that,  like  Calhoun's 
resolutions,  of  which  they  were  to  some  extent  a  copy, 
they  contemplated  secession  and  did  not  truly  represent 
the  opinions  of  the  people  of  the  State  ;  and  it  was  this 
refusal  that  led  to  the  split  in  his  party  and  brought 
about  his  defeat  after  a  service  of  thirty  years  in  the 
Senate  of  the  United  States. 

So  far  as  these  resolutions  can  be  said  to  have 
threatened  disunion,  there  can  be  no  question  that  Ben- 
ton was  right,  and  that  they  did  not  reflect  the  senti- 
ments of  the  people  of  the  State  ;  but  whether,  admit- 
ting that  they  did  contemplate  secession,  he  was  equally 
correct  in  charging  that  all  who  supported  them  were 
aiming  at  such  a  result  is  a  point  about  which  opinions 
may  well  differ.  At  this  time  there  was  probably  not 
a  handful  of  people  in  the  State  who  believed  that  mat- 
ters would  ever  be  carried  to  such  an  extreme  as  to  lead 
to  secession  ;  and  to  understand  these  resolutions  aright 
it  is  necessary  to  bear  in  mind  that  they  are  to  be  inter- 
preted, not  by  the  events  which  subsequently  took  place, 
but  by  the  opinions  that  were  current  among  those 
by  whom  they  were  adopted.  Tried  by  this  standard, 
the  vague  threat  or  warning  which  they  contain  may 
be  said  to  have  been  a  mere  bit  of  stage  thunder, 
meaning  anything  or  nothing,  according  to  the  fancy  of 
the  person  who  used  it,  and  therefore  harmless  so  long 
as  there  was  no  attempt  made   to  carry  it  into  execu- 


THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.  223 

tion.  Neither  then,  nor  at  any  subsequent  period,  did 
any  considerable  number  of  the  people  of  Missouri  ever 
look  to  the  secession  of  their  State  as  a  remedy  for  the 
injustice  of  which  they  felt  they  had  a  right  to  complain. 
Not  even  by  the  most  ardent  supporters  of  these  resolu- 
tions was  such  an  idea  generally  entertained  ;  for  among 
them  are  to  be  found  not  only  some  of  those  who  after- 
wards followed  the  fortunes  of  Benton,  but  also  others 
who,  like  Governor  Robert  M.  Stewart,  did  what  they 
could  to  defeat  him,  though  when  the  crisis  came,  ten 
years  later,  they  were  among  the  stan chest  defenders 
of  the  Union.  But  this  is  not  a  matter  upon  which  it 
is  necessary  to  enlarge.  All  that  we  are  interested  in 
knowing  is  that  these  resolutions  proved  to  be  the  w'edge 
that  split  the  Democratic  party,  and  gave  the  Whigs  a 
Senator  in  jjlace  of  Benton.  For  this  reason,  and  be- 
cause of  the  important  part  which  they  played  in  the  po- 
litical affairs  of  the  State  during  the  next  few  years, 
they  are  here  given  in  full :  — 

"  Resolved  hij  the  General  Assembly  of  the  State  of 
Missouri :  That  the  federal  Constitution  was  the  re- 
sult of  a  comi^romise  between  the  conflicting  interests 
of  the  States  which  formed  it,  and  in  no  part  of  that  in- 
strument is  to  be  found  any  delegation  ox  pow'er  to  Con- 
gress to  legislate  on  the  subject  of  slavery,  excepting 
some  special  provisions  having  in  view  the  prospective 
abolition  of  the  African  slave  trade  and  for  the  recovery 
of  fugitive  slaves.  Any  attempt,  therefore,  on  the  part 
of  Congress  to  legislate  on  the  subject,  so  as  to  affect 
the  institution  of  slavery  in  the  States,  in  the  District  of 
Columbia,  or  in  the  Territories,  is,  to  say  the  least,  a  vio- 
lation of  the  principles  upon  which  that  instrument  was 
founded. 


224  MISSOURI. 

"  2.  That  the  territories,  acquired  by  the  blood  and 
treasure  of  the  whole  nation,  ought  to  be  governed  for 
the  common  benefit  of  tlie  people  of  all  the  States,  and 
any  organization  of  the  territorial  govenmient,  exclud- 
ing the  citizens  of  any  part  of  the  Union  from  removing 
to  such  territories  with  their  property,  would  be  an  ex- 
ercise of  power  by  Congress  inconsistent  with  the  spirit 
upon  which  our  federal  compact  was  based,  insulting  to 
the  sovereignty  and  dignity  of  the  States  thus  affected, 
calculated  to  alienate  one  portion  of  the  Union  from 
another,  and  tending  ultimately  to  disunion. 

"  3.  That  this  General  Assembly  regard  the  conduct  of 
the  Northern  States  on  the  subject  of  slavery  as  releas- 
ing the  slaveholding  States  from  all  further  adherence 
to  the  basis  of  compromise  fixed  on  by  the  act  of  Congress 
of  March  6, 1820,  even  if  such  act  ever  did  impose  any 
obligation  upon  the  slaveholding  States,  and  authorizes 
them  to  insist  upon  their  rights  under  the  Constitution  ; 
but  for  the  sake  of  harmony,  and  for  the  preservation  of 
our  federal  Union,  they  will  still  sanction  the  applica- 
tion of  the  principles  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  to  the 
recent  territoi'ial  acquisitions,  if  by  such  concession  fu- 
ture aggressions  upon  the  equal  rights  of  the  States  may 
be  arrested,  and  the  spirit  of  anti-slavery  fanaticism  be 
extinguished. 

"  4.  That  the  right  to  prohibit  slavery  in  any  territory 
belongs  exclusively  to  the  people  thereof,  and  can  only 
be  exercised  by  them  in  forming  their  constitution  for  a 
state  government,  or  in  their  sovereign  capacity  as  an 
independent  State. 

"  5.  That  in  the  event  of  the  passage  of  any  act  of 
Congress  conflicting  with  the  principles  herein  expressed, 
Missouri  will  be  found  in  hearty  cooperation  with  the 


THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.  225 

slaveholding  States,  in  such  measures  as  may  be  deemed 
necessary  for  our  mutual  protection  against  the  en- 
croachments of  Northern  fanaticism." 

Leaving  out  of  consideration  the  covert  threat  and 
the  somewhat  truculent  language  in  which  these  resolu- 
tions are  couched,  and  regarding  slaves  simjjly  as  prop- 
erty, as  they  were  subsequently  decided  to  be  by  the 
highest  tribunal  in  the  land,  it  is  difficult  to  find  any- 
thing in  the  positions  here  taken  to  Avhich  a  fair-minded 
person  can  reasonably  object.  Benton,  however,  as  has 
been  said,  refused  to  abide  by  them,  and  appealed  from 
the  legislature  to  the  people  of  the  State.  His  reasons 
have  been  briefly  indicated,  though  it  is  proper  to  add 
that  back  of  them,  and  Ij'ing  far  deejier,  was  his  belief 
in  the  evil  of  slavery.  Upon  this  point,  his  position 
cannot  be  mistaken  ;  and  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  it  was 
his  conviction  as  to  the  difficulty  of  getting  rid  of  the 
evil  when  it  was  once  firmly  established  —  a  conviction 
shared  by  many  thoughtful  men  in  the  State  —  that 
made  him  all  the  more  determined  in  his  opposition  to 
any  measure  that  made  its  extension  possible.  "  The 
incurability  of  the  evil,"  he  said,  on  a  subsequent  occa- 
sion, "  is  the  greatest  objection  to  the  extension  of 
slavery.  If  it  is  wrong  for  the  legislature  to  inflict  an 
evil  which  can  be  cured,  how  much  more  to  inflict  one 
that  is  incurable  and  against  the  will  of  the  people  who 
are  to  endure  it  forever.  I  quarrel  with  no  one  for 
deeming  slavery  a  blessing ;  I  deem  it  an  evil,  and 
would  neither  adopt  it,  nor  impose  it  upon  others." 
How  the  problem  was  finally  to  be  solved  in  regions 
where  slaveiy  existed  seemed  to  him,  as  he  frankly  con- 
fessed, to  be  beyond  the  reach  of  human  wisdom ;  but, 
added  he,  "  there  is  a  wisdom  above  human,  and  to  that 


226  MISSOURI. 

we    must  look.     In  the  mean  time  do  not  extend  the 
evil." 

This  is  certainly  a  strong  presentation  of  the  case  ; 
and  if  it  had  been  made  in  opposition  to  an  attempt  on 
the  part  of  Congress  to  legislate  slavery  into  a  region 
where  it  had  not  previously  existed,  it  would  not  have 
been  easy  to  frame  a  satisfactory  reply.  But,  in  point 
of  fact,  Congress  was  not  asked  or  expected  to  do  any- 
thing of  the  kind.  All  that  these  resolutions  demanded 
was  that  Congress  should  not  interfere  in  the  matter, 
save,  perhaps,  in  the  way  of  compromise.  What  was 
wanted  was  that  the  question  should  be  left  open,  so 
that  the  people  of  the  slaveholding  States  might  go  into 
any  of  the  territories  Avhich  they  had  helped  to  acquire, 
taking  their  slave  property  with  them  in  case  they  so 
desired,  upon  the  same  footing  as  that  upon  which  the 
people  of  the  free  North  were  permitted  to  move  into 
these  same  territories  with  their  horses,  or  any  other 
articles  of  personal  property  that  they  might  possess. 
Of  course,  in  such  an  event  it  was  possible  that  the  peo- 
ple in  some  of  these  territories,  when  framing  their  state 
constitutions,  might  see  fit  to  sanction  slavery,  though 
this  was  by  no  means  certain.  But  even  if  it  had  been, 
it  would  hardly  have  afforded  any  just  grounds  for  op- 
posing the  policy  of  "  non-interference,"  as  it  was  called, 
since  the  question  was  not  whether  Congress  should  or 
should  not  legislate  slavery  into  the  territories,  but 
whether  it  should  leave  the  people  of  each  territory  free 
to  decide  that  matter  for  themselves.  Between  these 
two  courses  there  was  a  wide  diflference  ;  and  whilst  in 
the  former  case  Benton's  argument  would  have  been  per- 
fectly relevant,  in  the  latter  it  was  out  of  place,  for  the 
reason  that  there  was  no  necessary  connection  between 


THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.  227 

a  desire  to  extend  slavery  into  the  new  territories  and  a 
denial  of  the  power  of  Congress  to  legislate  upon  the 
subject.  Indeed,  the  very  reverse  of  this  was  true,  since 
it  was  possible  to  be  a  believer  in  the  constitutionality 
of  the  doctrine  of  "  non-interference,"  and  to  be  opposed 
to  the  extension  of  the  slave  area.  In  other  words,  a 
person  might  be  in  favor  of  transforming  a  territory 
into  a  free  State,  when  the  time  came  to  make  the 
change,  though  he  denied  the  power  of  Congress  to  pre- 
vent the  introduction  of  slaves  into  that  territory,  as 
long  as  it  remained  in  that  condition.  So  far  from  in- 
volving any  inconsistency,  this  position  was  perfectly 
logical  ;  and  as  subsequent  events  abundantly  showed, 
it  was  the  position  held  by  a  large  propartion  of  the 
people  of  the  State,  including  some  of  those  who  voted 
for  the  resolutions,  and  who  were  known  as  anti-Benton 
Democrats,  or  "  Softs." 

Benton  did  not  recognize  this  fact,  or,  what  is  far  more 
probable,  he  did  not  think  it  necessary  to  take  advan- 
tage of  it ;  otherwise  it  would  have  been  easy  for  him, 
without  any  very  great  sacrifice  of  opinion,  so  to  shape 
his  course  as  to  conciliate  those  of  the  malcontents  in 
his  own  party  who,  whilst  differing  with  him  as  to  the 
means  by  which  they  hoped  to  attain  a  certain  end,  fully 
agreed  with  him  as  to  the  end  itself.  Unfortunately  for 
the  success  of  his  candidacy,  a  spirit  of  conciliation 
formed  no  part  of  Benton's  disposition,  and  the  experi- 
ence of  a  quarter  of  a  century  and  more,  during  which 
he  had  been  the  acknowledged  leader  of  the  party  that 
controlled  the  political  destinies  of  the  State,  had  not 
been  of  such  a  character  as  to  lead  him  to  cultivate  that 
virtue.  Gifted  with  superb  courage,  physical  as  well  as 
moral,  and  possessed  of  an  imperious  will,  he  was  prob- 


228  MISSOURI. 

ably  never  more  at  home  than  when  engaged  in  one  of 
those  fierce  political  contests  in  which  quarter  was 
neither  given  nor  expected.  In  all  such  cases  his  prac- 
tice had  been  to  crush,  not  placate  ;  and  in  the  present 
instance  his  natural  tendency  to  deal  with  his  opjjonents 
in  this  summary  fashion  was  no  doubt  strengthened  by 
the  conviction  that  those  who  supported  these  resolutions 
were  secretly  aiming  at  disunion.  With  all  such,  or 
with  those  whom  he  only  suspected  of  such  a  purpose, 
Benton  held  no  terms.  Devotion  to  the  Union  had 
come  to  be  with  him  the  one  ruling  idea,  and  thus  it 
may  have  happened  to  him,  as  it  not  unfrequently  does 
to  strong  natures,  when  similai'ly  placed,  that  he  mis- 
took the  individual  prejudices  and  animosities  that  had 
sprung  from  the  stormy  debates  in  which  he  had  parti- 
cipated, for  the  dictates  of  reason  and  patriotism.  Such, 
in  fact,  appears  to  have  been  the  case.  By  some  inex- 
plicable process  he  had  satisfied  himself  that  Calhoun's 
object  was  to  bring  about  a  separation  of  the  States,  and 
as  these  resolutions  which  he  was  called  on  to  obey  em- 
bodied the  South  Carolinian's  views  as  to  the  power  of 
Congress  to  legislate  upon  the  subject  of  slavery,  he  not 
unnaturally  transferred  to  those  who  had  been  instru- 
mental in  securing  their  adoption  a  portion  of  the  per- 
sonal hostility  with  which  he  appears  to  have  regarded 
that  greatly  misrepresented  and  much-abused  man  and 
every  measure  with  which  he  was  prominently  identi- 
fied. 

The  circumstances,  however,  were  very  different, 
now,  from  what  they  had  been  during  the  earlier  por- 
tion of  Benton's  career.  A  generation  of  voters  had 
grown  up  who  "  knew  not  Joseph,"  and  among  them 
were  a  number  of  comparatively  young  men,  who  were 


THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.  229 

ambitious  of  political  preferment,  and  who  afterwards 
attained  and  wore  worthily  the  highest  honors  within  the 
gift  of  the  people  of  the  State.  As  a  rule,  they  were 
men  who,  in  the  expressive  idiom  of  the  time,  were  ac- 
customed to  do  their  own  thinking  ;  and  as  they  re- 
garded the  political  situation  through  an  altogether  dif- 
ferent medium  from  that  which  enveloped  the  Capitol  at 
"Washington,  they  may  be  excused  if  they  failed  to  see 
in  these  resolutions  the  evidence  of  a  purpose  to  break 
up  the  Union.  They  had  yet  to  learn  that  the  assertion 
of  the  rights  to  which  they  believed  they  were  entitled 
under  the  Constitution  was  a  political  crime  ;  and  they 
were  not  ready  to  admit  that  the  declaration  of  their 
intention  to  make  common  cause  with  the  other  slave- 
holding  States  in  case  of  a  refusal  on  the  part  of  the 
free  and  pojDulous  North  to  grant  these  rights  was  proof 
of  disloyalty.  It  did  not  need  the  authority  of  Webster 
to  convince  them  that  "  a  bargain  broken  on  one  side  is 
broken  on  all  sides." 

When,  therefore,  Benton,  in  the  course  of  the  tremen- 
dous struggle  which  he  now  made  for  the  retention  of 
his  political  power,  asserted  that  an  adherence  to  these 
resolutions  would  inevitably  lead  to  secession,  and  con- 
tended that  those  who  knowingly  supported  them  were 
endeavoring  to  bring  about  such  a  result,  the  charge 
was  met  by  an  indignant  denial.  It  was  all  the  an- 
swer to  which  it  was  entitled  ;  for,  like  so  many  other 
attempts  that  have  been  made  to  impeach  the  motives  of 
an  entire  party  on  the  strength  of  an  induction,  it  was 
based  upon  a  false  premise,  the  exceptions  being  too 
numerous  to  justify  the  conclusion.  But  even  if  this 
had  not  been  so,  and  his  opponents  had  been  as  disloyal 
as  he  painted  them,  it  would  not  have  helped  his  cause, 


230  MISSOURI. 

for  the  reason  that  the  people  of  the  State  could  not 
be  made  to  believe  that  the  political  situation  was  as 
urgent  as  he  insisted  that  it  was.  So  far  were  they 
from  sharing  in  his  apprehensions  that  there  never  was 
a  time  when  they  were  more  actively  engaged  in  advanc- 
ing their  private  interests  and  pushing  forward  those 
measures  upon  which  the  future  welfare  and  prosperity 
of  the  State  were  thought  to  depend.  Hence  it  was  that 
almost  the  only  effect  of  the  appeal,  and  of  the  fierce  per- 
sonal element  which  he  introduced  into  the  canvass,  was 
to  make  the  breach  between  his  former  friends  and"  ad- 
herents practically  irreparable. 

In  tliis  factional  fight  the  Whigs  took  no  immediate 
part.  They  had  no  love  for  Benton  ;  and  whilst  it  is 
probable  that  a  majority  of  tliem  would,  if  put  to  the 
test,  have  sympathized  with  him  in  his  opposition  to  the 
extension  of  slavery  into  territory  then  free,  as  they  cer- 
tainly did  in  his  denunciation  of  everything  that  savored 
of  secession,  yet  they  did  not  regard  the  situation  as  be- 
ing serious  enough  to  call  upon  them  to  forget  old  party 
affiliations  so  far  as  to  aid  in  giving  him  a  new  lease  of 
power.  For  thirty  years,  during  much  of  which  time 
they  had  been  tauglit  to  look  upon  him  as  the  embodi- 
ment of  all  that  was  politically  evil,  they  had  steadily 
but  unsuccessfully  opposed  him  and  his  methods,  and 
they  were  not  prepared  to  abandon  the  contest  now, 
when  they  saw  the  prize  of  victory  almost  within  their 
grasp.  Accordingly,  they  kept  their  organization  intact ; 
and  the  result  of  the  election  which  occurred  in  the 
summer  of  1850  fully  justified  this  policy.  In  the  tri- 
angular contest  which  then  took  place,  they  succeeded  in 
returning  sixty-four  members  to  the  General  Assembly, 
one  of  whose  duties  it  was  to  choose  a'  United  States 


THE  JACKSON  RESOLUTIONS.  231 

Senator  in  place  of  Benton.  This  gave  them  a  plurality 
in  that  body,  as  the  Benton  men,  who  came  next  in  point 
of  numbers,  were  only  able  to  elect  fifty-five,  and  the 
anti-Benton  men,  or  "  Softs,"  had  to  be  content  with 
thirty-eight.^  On  the  10th  of  January,  1851,  the  legisla- 
ture met  in  joint  session,  but  failed  to  elect,  neither  party 
having  a  majority  of  all  the  votes  cast.  Finally,  after 
some  ten  or  twelve  days  spent  in  voting  by  day  and  cau- 
cussing  by  night,  a  break  occurred  in  the  ranks  of  the  anti- 
Benton  men,  and  on  the  fortieth  ballot  enough  of  them, 
under  the  lead  of  Senator  Robert  M.  Stewart,  went  over 
to  Henry  S.  Geyer,  the  Whig  candidate,  to  secure  his 
election,  the  vote  being,  for  Geyer  80,  Benton  55,  String- 
fellow  (anti-Benton  Democrat)  18,  and  5  anti-Benton 
men  scattering. 

With  this  defeat  Benton's  official  career  may  be  said 
to  have  been  brought  to  a  close ;  for  although  he  repre- 
sented the  St.  Louis  district  in  the  Congress  of  1852-54, 
during  which  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  was  passed,  and 
was  conspicuous  in  his  opposition  to  that  measure,  yet  in 
his  own  State  he  was  steadily  losing  ground.  The  prin- 
ciple of  non-interference  by  Congress  in  the  domestic 
affairs  of  a  territory  which  was  then  formally  announced, 
and  the  consequent  abrogation,  in  specific  terms,  of  the 
Missouri  Compromise,  had  come  to  be  regarded  as  a  car- 
dinal doctrine  by  one  wing  of  the  Democratic  party,  and 
the  current  of  opinion  in  its  favor  was  too  strong  to  be 
successfully  resisted.  At  the  next  election  Benton  was 
beaten  by  Luther  M.  Kennett,  formerly  a  Whig,  but 
who  now  ran  as  a  Native  American,  or  "Know  Noth- 
ing," the  Whigs,  as  a  party,  having  disappeared  from 

^  This  was  the  first  vote  given  for  senator  on  January  10, 
1851,  but  there  were  two  members  absent  and  one  had  died. 


232  MISSOURI. 

the  field  of  Missouri  politics.  In  1856  he  again  came 
before  the  public  for  their  suffrages,  this  time  as  a 
candidate  for  the  office  of  governor.  Although  sev- 
enty-four years  of  age,  and  suffering  from  an  incurable 
disease,  yet,  in  the  course  of  the  canvass  which  he  then 
made,  he  traveled  over  the  entire  State,  a  distance  of 
some  twelve  hundred  miles,  and  made  forty  speeches, 
each  one  of  which  was  one  or  two  hours  in  length.  Un- 
der the  circumstances  this  was,  as  his  biographer  well 
says,  "  a  remarkable  feat,"  but  it  was  without  avail. 
His  star  was  on  the  wane,  and  in  the  poll  which  then 
took  place  he  was  third,  receiving  less  than  twenty-eight 
thousand  votes,  out  of  a  total  of  one  hundred  and  fifteen 
thousand.  In  the  senatorial  election,  or  elections,  for, 
owing  to  a  failure  to  elect  at  the  previous  session,  two 
of  them  came  off  during  the  ensuing  winter,  his  friends 
once  more  brought  him  forward,  but  with  no  better  suc- 
cess. 

This  was  his  last  appearance  in  the  political  arena, 
though  in  the  autumn  of  1856  "  he  made,  by  request,  a 
lecturing  tour  in  New  England,  speaking  on  the  danger 
of  the  political  situation  and  the  imperative  necessity  of 
preserving  the  Union,  which  he  now  saw  to  be  gravely 
threatened."  In  April,  1858,  he  quietly  passed  away  at 
his  house  in  Washington,  busy  to  the  last  upon  the  liter- 
ary work  to  which  he  devoted  himself  when  he  first  lost 
his  seat  in  Congress,  and  which  is,  after  all,  the  founda- 
tion upon  which  his  claims  to  remembrance  must  rest. 
As  a  Senator  and  in  matters  of  national  concern  he  was 
overshadowed  by  some  of  his  compeers ;  and  in  bring- 
ing forward  and  advocating  measures  like  the  bills  to 
repeal  the  salt  tax,  to  graduate  the  price  of  the  public 
lands,  and,  perhaps,  some  others  that  were  of   special 


INTERNAL   IMPROVEMENTS.  233 

service  to  the  State  and  section,  and  which  could  hardly 
have  been  carried  without  his  support,  he  cannot  justly 
be  credited  with  originality,  since  he  was  but  following 
in  paths  that  were  by  no  means  new.  The  one  measure 
wliich  may  be  said  to  have  been  peculiarly  his  own,  and 
upon  which  he  certainly  prided  himself,  was  the  "  Ex- 
punging Resolution,"  as  it  was  called  ;  and  this,  to  say 
the  least,  was  a  piece  of  child's  play,  unworthy  of  Benton, 
and  beneath  the  consideration  of  any  deliberative  body 
that  aimed  at  official  dignity. 

Amid  the  turmoil  and  excitement  attending  these 
political  contests  it  is  a  satisfaction  to  be  able  to  say  that 
the  material  and  educational  interests  of  the  State  were 
not  neglected.  In  February,  1849,  shortly  after  the 
adoption  of  the  Jackson  resolutions,  the  legislature  au- 
thorized the  construction  of  the  Missouri  Pacific  Railroad 
from  the  city  of  St.  Louis  to  the  western  border  of  the 
State.  The  preliminary  surveys  were  at  once  begun, 
and  in  July,  1850,  "  ground  was  formally  broken  "  at 
the  eastern  end  of  the  line.  It  was  the  first  permanent 
work  of  the  kind  done  within  the  State,  though  it  was 
not  by  any  means  the  first  essay  which  the  people  of 
Missoui'i  had  made  in  the  field  of  mternal  improvements. 
As  early  as  1836,  they  had  awoke  to  the  fact  that  the 
Missouri,  the  Mississippi,  and  their  tributaries  did  not 
afford  all  the  means  of  intercommunication  necessary  to 
the  development  of  the  different  sections  of  the  State. 
Centres  of  population  had  sprung  up  at  a  distance  from 
these  great  commercial  highways,  and  it  was  a  matter  of 
the  first  importance  to  provide  them  with  outlets  for  their 
surplus  products.  The  dirt  roads  on  which  the  people 
had  hitherto  been  dependent  were  often  impassable,  and 
the  mode  of  transportation  which  they  afforded  was  felt 


234  MISSOURI. 

to  be  too  slow  to  suit  the  fast  increasing  wants  of  the 
age.  Aocoi'dingly,  the  legislature  which  met  in  that 
year  chartered  a  number  of  roads,  though  it  is  evident 
from  an  examination  of  these  charters  that  the  people  of 
the  State  had  not  yet  formed  any  very  clear  ideas  as  to 
the  relative  value  of  steam  or  horses  as  a  motive  power, 
and  were,  in  fact,  somewhat  undecided  as  to  what  sort  of 
road  they  really  wanted,  whether  of  plank,  rail,  or  simple 
macadam.  But  whilst  they  may  be  said  to  have  been  in 
doubt  upon  this  important  point,  they  appear  to  have 
had  no  misgivings  as  to  the  possible  earnings  of  these 
roads.  At  least,  this  is  the  not  unnatural  inference 
from  the  fact  that  upon  some  of  them  the  prospective 
dividends  were,  by  the  terms  of  their  charters,  limited 
to  twenty  per  cent.  —  a  wise  precaution  no  doubt  under 
certain  contingencies,  but  needless  in  the  present  case. 
Fortunately  for  Missouri,  her  legislators  were  not  so 
far  dazzled  by  visions  of  the  golden  harvest  that  was 
to  follow  upon  the  completion  of  these  roads,  as  to  lead 
them  to  commit  the  State  to  the  task  of  carrying  out 
the  system  of  internal  improvements  which  they  had 
authorized.  Charters  they  were  willing  to  grant  —  any 
number  of  them,  and  containing  the  most  liberal  provi- 
sions ;  but  when  it  came  to  engaging  the  State  in  the  work 
of  building  these  roads,  they  wisely  called  a  halt.  Under 
the  circumstances  this  course,  involving,  as  it  did,  a  cer- 
tain self-denial,  was  as  wise  as  it  was  unusual ;  and  if 
Missouri,  dui'ing  the  next  few  years,  escaped  a  portion  of 
the  pecuniary  troubles  that  bore  so  heavily  upon  some  of 
her  sister  States,  it  was  owing  to  the  conservative  spirit 
which  then  ruled  in  her  legislative  councils. 

In  the  fourteen  years  that  elapsed  between  1836  and 
1850,  there  was  a  notable  gi'owth  in  the  wealth  and 


INTERNAL    IMPROVEMENTS.  2-"5 

population  of  the  State,  and  with  it  came  a  change  in 
the  opinions  of  those  who  had  succeeded  to  the  man- 
agement of  her  finances.  To  a  certain  extent,  the  de- 
parture which  now  took  place  from  the  conservative 
methods  tliat  had  hitherto  prevailed  can  be  justified. 
The  State  was  virtually  out  of  debt ;  her  revenue  had 
largely  increased,  and  granting  that  it  is  ever  right  or 
prudent  for  a  State  to  engage  in  a  work  of  internal  im- 
provements, or  "  developing  her  resources,"  as  enter- 
prises of  this  kind  were  called,  it  is  safe  to  say  that  the 
time  had  now  come  when  the  people  of  Missouri  could 
afford  to  indulge  in  such  an  undertaking.  Tlie  trouble, 
however,  when  a  State  once  embarks  in  a  business  of  this 
kind,  is  to  find  a  stopping  place.  The  doors  of  the  public 
treasury  having  been  thrown  open,  local  interests  at  once 
step  in,  and  as  each  section  of  the  State  has  an  undoubted 
claim  to  recognition,  it  often  ends  in  a  general  scramble 
for  the  spoils.  Such  seems  to  have  been  the  case  in  the 
present  instance.  No  sooner  was  it  understood  that  the 
Missouri  Pacific  road  was  to  receive  a  subvention  from 
the  public  purse  than  there  arose  the  demand  for  other 
trunk  roads,  to  each  of  which  the  State  was  expected  to 
lend  assistance.  In  quick  succession  the  Southwest 
Branch,  as  the  St.  Louis  and  San  Francisco  was  then 
called,  the  Iron  Mountain,  and  the  North  Missouri  roads 
were  chartered ;  and  in  the  short  space  of  eight  years, 
including  the  sums  voted  to  the  Hannibal  and  St.  Jo- 
seph, these  dlfi^erent  roads  received  from  the  State, 
in  the  shape  of  guaranteed  bonds,  loans  amounting,  in 
the  aggregate,  to  about  twenty-four  millions  of  dollars. 
Upon  this  sum  the  roads  were  expected  to  pay  the 
interest ;  but  inasmuch  as  with  but  one  exception  they 
failed  to  do  so,  the  State  became  bound  for  the  entire 


236  MISSOURI. 

sum  upon  which  default  was  made,  amounting  to  some 
twenty  millions  of  doUars.  At  the  time,  this  was  a 
heavy  load,  especially  when  supplemented,  as  it  was  soon 
afterwards,  by  the  large  sums  which  the  State  was  called 
upon  to  pay  out  during  the  war  of  the  rebellion.  How- 
ever, by  judicious  management  and  a  willingness  on  the 
part  of  her  citizens  to  meet  these  additional  expenditures 
by  a  corresponding  increase  in  the  rate  of  taxation,  a 
goodly  portion  of  this  debt  has  already  been  discharged, 
and  the  balance,  amounting  in  1887  to  fourteen  million 
dollars,  has  been  so  placed  that  it  can  be  met  without 
causing  any  undue  hardship.  To  a  great  extent  this  re- 
sult has  been  brought  about  by  the  very  development 
these  roads  were  intended  to  effect ;  and  to  grieve,  there- 
fore, over  the  amount  which  they  have  cost,  or  which  is 
yet  due  is  as  idle  as  would  be  "  the  lamentations  of  a 
boy  over  the  loss  of  the  bait  with  which  he  had  caught 
the  fish." 

Simultaneously  with  the  adoption  of  these  plans  of  in- 
ternal Improvement,  measures  were  taken  for  extending 
and  improving  the  school  system  of  the  State  and  estab- 
lishing it  upon  a  broader  financial  basis.  Hitherto  these 
"  free  schools,"  as  the  institutions  organized  under  this 
system  were  called,  depended  for  their  support  upon  the 
income  derived  from  certain  funds  which  belonged  to  the 
State,  the  county,  and  the  township  respectively,  and 
upon  the  voluntary  contributions  of  those  who  were  in  a 
condition  and  were  willing  to  avail  themselves  of  the 
advantages  which  the  system  offered.  The  sums  re- 
ceived from  these  several  sources  were  small,  that  from 
the  State  amounting  in  the  most  prosjDerous  year  to  less 
than  seventy  thousand  dollars, —  a  mere  drop  in  the 
bucket  when  compared  with  what  might  have  been  use- 


EDUCATION.  .  237 

fully  expended.  For  this  reason,  and  perhaps  owing, 
also,  in  some  degree  to  the  sparseness  of  jiopulation  and 
to  a  feeling  of  prejudice  which  still  lingered  in  certain 
quarters  against  the  use  of  schools  that  were  wrongly- 
called  "  free,"  the  cause  of  public  education  was  in  any- 
thing but  a  flourishing  condition.  In  some  portions 
of  the  State,  especially  in  the  remote  and  thinly  popu- 
lated districts,  schoolhouses  were  necessarily  few  and  far 
apart ;  and  in  those  regions  where  they  were  more  com- 
mon, they  were  often  "  nothing  more  than  log  huts,  un- 
plastered  and  unceiled,  with  chimneys  constructed  of 
sticks,  mud,  and  straw,  and  without  school  furniture,  un- 
less long,  backless  benches,  made  of  inverted  puncheons, 
and  wide  planks  fastened  to  the  wall  for  a  writing  desk, 
can  be  called  furniture."  Rude  and  unsuitable  as  these 
buildings  would  now  be  considered,  they  were  all  that 
could  then  be  afforded,  and  not  unfrequently,  it  is  to  be 
feared,  they  were  in  keeping  with  the  qualifications  of 
the  teachers  and  the  elementary  character  of  the  in- 
struction given.  Webster's  Speller  and  Pike's  Arithme- 
tic were  the  text-books  in  general  use,  and  when  a  boy 
had  "  been  through  "  these,  and  was  able  to  write  "  fine 
hand,"  his  education,  so  far  as  tliese  primitive  institu- 
tions were  concerned,  may  be  said  to  have  been  com- 
pleted. 

Such,  in  brief,  seems  to  have  been  the  condition  of 
public  instruction  throughout  the  State  of  Missouri  dur- 
ing the  earlier  yeai'S  of  her  existence.  In  a  few  favored 
localities,  as  for  instance  in  St.  Louis  and  in  some  of  the 
other  wealthy  and  populous  counties,  a  better  state  of 
affairs  might  have  been  found  ;  but  this  was  the  result  of 
local  causes,  and  was  in  nowise  due  to  any  action  on  the 
part  of  the  State,  considered  as  such.     Indeed,  when  re- 


238  MISSOURI. 

garded  from  this  point  of  view,  it  must  be  confessed  that 
Missouri,  despite  the  positive  injunctions  of  her  constitu- 
tion to  the  contrary,  had  done  but  Httle  to  forvrard  the 
cause  of  popular  education.  Even  the  small  sums  which, 
from  1842  to  1854,  were  annually  apportioned,  for  this 
purpose,  among  the  children  of  the  State,  were  derived 
from  a  fund,  the  principal  of  which  she  had  received,  at 
different  times,  from  the  general  government  in  the 
shape  of  gifts  in  money  and  land. 

Fortunately,  all  this  was  now  to  be  changed.  The 
growth  of  the  State  in  wealth  and  population,  and  the 
diversification  of  interests  that  had  followed  in  its  train, 
made  a  higher  standard  of  education  necessary,  and  lent 
additional  force  to  the  demand  which  came  up  for  an 
increase  in  the  facilities  with  which  such  an  education 
was  to  be  obtained.  The  great  mass  of  the  people  were 
no  longer  content  with  an  occasional  schoolhouse  of  logs, 
or  with  the  rudimentarj^  branches  in  wliich  they  had  hith- 
erto been  instructed ;  and  although  the  wisdom  of  a  policy 
which  permits  any  part  of  the  school  fund  to  be  "  wasted 
in  bricks  and  mortar,"  or  allows  one  portion  of  the  com- 
munity to  be  taxed  in  order  to  teach  another  music  and 
German,  may  well  be  questioned,  yet  it  cannot  be  denied 
that  a  long  step  forward  was  necessary,  if  the  State  was 
to  be  kept  abreast  of  her  neighbors  in  matters  of  educa- 
tion. This  fact  was  duly  recognized,  and  at  the  session 
of  1852-53  the  General  Assembly  passed  a  law  requir- 
ing twenty-five  per  cent,  of  the  annual  revenue  of  the 
State  to  be  set  apart  and  divided  between  the  different 
counties,  according  to  the  number  of  children  of  school 
age  in  each.  The  first  full  apportionment  under  this 
law  took  place  in  1855.  With  the  exception  of  the 
seven  years  between  A.  d.  1861  and  1867  inclusive,  it 


EDUCATION.  239 

has  been  regularly  continued  ever  since,  and  so  satis- 
factory have  been  the  results  produced,  that  in  1875, 
when  a  new  constitution  was  adoj)ted,  a  provision  con- 
tinuing and  perpetuating  this  appropriation  was  made 
part  of  the  organic  law,  thus  fixing,  so  far  as  it  was  pos- 
sible to  do  so,  the  policy  of  the  State. 

Liberal  as  was  this  provision,  it  is  by  no  means  all 
that  the  people  of  Missouri  have  done  for  the  cause  of 
popular  education.  From  A^arious  sources  the  State, 
county,  and  township  funds  have  been  increased,  until 
they  now  amount  to  ten  million  five  hundred  thousand 
dollars,  a  good  part  of  which  is  invested  in  the  bonds  of 
the  State.  The  interest  upon  this  sum  is  all  that  can 
be  used,  but  it  has  reached  an  amount  which,  added  to 
the  annual  appropriation  and  to  the  receipts  from  tuition 
fees  and  the  voluntarily  imposed  local  taxes,  swelled  the 
grand  total,  for  the  year  ending  June  30,  1886,  to  the 
magnificent  proportions  of  five  millions  of  dollars. 

In  disposing  of  these  amounts  as  from  year  to  year 
they  became  available,  care  has  been  taken  to  add  to 
the  number  of  primary  as  distinguished  from  high 
schools,  experience  having  shown  that  they  are  rela- 
tively of  greater  importance,  owing  to  the  number  of 
pupils  who  attend  them  and  do  not  advance  any  farther. 
Institutions  for  dispensing  a  higher  education,  however, 
are  by  no  means  ignored.  "  In  the  lai'ger  cities  and 
towns,  and  in  many  of  the  smaller  towns  and  villages, 
prosperous  graded  schools  are  maintained  for  eight,  nine, 
or  ten  months  in  the  year ;  and  nearly  all  support  a 
high  school,"  with  a  curriculum  extending  through  two, 
three,  or  four  years.  Besides  these  institutions  of  a 
higher  class,  there  are  in  the  State  four  normal  schools, 
one  of   which   is  intended  to  furnish  teachers  for  the 


240  MISSOURI. 

colored  schools,  and  a  State  University,  to  which  are 
attached  a  school  of  mines  and  an  agricultural  and 
mechanical  de2:)artment.  To  the  suj^port  of  all  these 
the  State  contributes  liberally,  the  amount  of  each  ap- 
propriation varying  with  the  necessities  of  the  case.  Of 
the  benevolent  institutions,  the  asylums  for  the  blind, 
the  deaf  and  dumb,  and  the  insane,  it  is  unnecessary  to 
speak  at  length.  In  number  and  thoroughness  of  equip- 
ment they  have  kept  pace  with  the  demands  of  the  time, 
and  they  are  maintained  upon  a  scale  of  liberality  be- 
fitting the  State. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

KAXSAS     TROUBLES  :      PROGRESS     OF     THE     STATE  : 
ELECTION    OF    ISGO. 

From  considerations  of  this  pleasant  and  peaceful 
character,  the  people  of  Missouri  were  recalled  by  the 
adojition,  in  May,  1854,  of  the  Kansas  bill  and  the 
struggle  to  which  it  gave  rise  between  freedom  and  slav- 
ery for  the  possession  of  that  fair  land.  As  has  already 
been  intimated,  the  region  which  it  was  proposed,  under 
this  act,  to  organize  into  a  territory,  was  a  part  of  the 
Louisiana  Purchase,  and  as  it  was  situated  north  of 
the  line  of  thirty-six  degrees  and  thirty  minutes  north 
latitude,  it  of  course  came  within  the  limits  within  wliich 
slavery  was  prohibited  by  the  terms  of  the  Missouri 
Comjiromise.  This  measure,  it  was  then  contended,  was 
no  longer  binding,  having  been  superseded  by  the  com- 
promise of  1850 ;  and  that  there  might  be  no  doubt  as 
to  the  opinion  of  Congress  upon  this  point,  a  clause  was 
inserted  into  the  Kansas  bill,  by  virtue  of  which  the 
Missouri  Compromise  was  expressly  repealed,  and  the 
people  of  the  newly  organized  territory  were  left  to  de- 
cide whether  they  would  or  would  not  sanction  the  exist- 
ence of  slavery  within  its  limits,  just  as  had  lately  been 
done  in  the  cases  of  New  Mexico  and  Utah,  and  as  had 
been  the  custom  in  the  early  days  of  the  Republic. 
To  any  one  not  wedded  to  an  idea,  or  not  blinded  by 


242  MISSOURI. 

political  prejudices,  this  return  to  the  policy  of  the 
fathers  seems  like  a  fair  and  equitable  settlement  of  the 
question.  The  Missouri  Compromise  had  been  tried  and 
found  wanting,  and  in  abrogating  it,  as  it  undoubtedly 
had  the  right  to  do,  Congress  not  only  performed  a 
tardy  act  of  justice  to  the  South,  but  it  anticipated  by 
some  three  years  the  decision  of  the  supreme  com-t, 
which  pronounced  this  same  comj^romise  to  be  uncon- 
stitutional, and  therefore  null  and  void.  In  taking  this 
action,  then,  Congress  certamly  gave  no  grounds  for  sup- 
posing that  it  was  actuated  by  a  wish  to  legislate  slavery 
into  the  territory,  neither,  on  the  other  hand,  did  it 
show  any  evidence  of  an  intention  to  exclude  it  there- 
from ;  but  in  throwing  oi)en  this  region  to  settlement  by 
the  people  alike  of  the  slave  and  free  States,  and  declar- 
ing that  its  object  in  so  doing  was  to  leave  them  "  per- 
fectly free  to  form  and  regulate  their  domestic  institu- 
tions in  their  own  way,  subject  only  to  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,"  it  furnished  the  best  possible 
proof  of  its  desire  to  eliminate,  as  far  as  it  could  be 
done,  "  the  dangerous  and  exciting  question  of  slaverj^  " 
from  the  field  of  national  legislation,  and  confine  it  to 
the  people  who  were  directly  interested  in  solving  it. 
That  such  would  have  been  the  result  if  the  settlement 
of  the  territory  had  been  permitted  to  go  forward  in 
the  usual  way,  without  any  outside  interference,  there  is 
every  reason  to  believe  ;  but  the  experiment  was  never 
tried,  owing  to  the  course  which  the  anti-slavery  faction 
of  the  North  now  thought  proper  to  pursue.  They 
were  determined  to  prevent  the  foi'mation  of  any  more 
slave  States  ;  and  to  this  end  they  began,  even  before  the 
Kansas  biU  became  a  law,  the  organization  of  Emigrant 
Aid  companies,  the   object  of  which  was   to  flood  the 


KANSAS   TROUBLES.  243 

territory  with  voters  ^  who  should  control  it  in  the  inter- 
est of  freedom.  In  this  they  ultimately  succeeded  ;  and 
whilst  it  is  not  possible  to  approve  of  the  revolutionary 
measures  to  which  they  and  their  agents  in  Kansas  were 
obliged  to  resort  in  order  to  effect  this  purpose,  yet  there 
are,  to-day,  but  few  who  Avill  regret  the  result. 

As  might  have  been  expected  this  course  added  not  a 
little  to  the  excitement  which  the  discussion  of  the  ques- 
tion of  slavery  in  the  territories  had  created  among  the 
people  of  the  Southern  States.  They  regarded  it  as  an 
effort  on  the  part  of  the  North  to  evade  the  evident  spirit 
and  intent  of  the  law,  and  it  led  to  the  formation  of  coun- 
ter associations  and  "  blue  lodges,"  wliich  were  intended 
to  perform  in  behalf  of  slavery  the  same  kind  of  work 
that  was  expected  of  the  aid  societies  in  the  cause  of 
freedom.  Especially  was  this  the  case  in  Missouri,  which, 
being  coterminous  along  its  western  border  with  the  new 
territory,  was  supposed  to  be  in  a  position  to  be  more 
seriously  affected  by  the  result  than  was  any  other  por- 
tion of  the  South.  Evidently,  if  Kansas  were  to  be- 
come a  free  State  it  would  make  of  Missouri  a  huge 

1  The  character  of  much  of  this  emigTation  may  be  gathered 
from  the  fact  that  "  the  Kansas  societies,  leag-ues,  and  committees 
.  .  sent  out  men  only,"  and  that  in  some  of  their  bands  Sharps' 
rifles  were  more  numerous  than  agricultural  implements.  Min- 
ing' camps,  we  may  remark,  are  peopled  on  this  principle,  but 
bond  Jide  settlers  in  a  farming  country  do  not  emigrate  in  this 
one-sided  fashion,  —  a  truth  of  which  the  Hon.  Eli  Thayer  seems 
to  have  caught  a  glimpse,  when  he  tells  us  that  ' '  when  the  Mis- 
sourians  went  into  Kansas  to  settle,  they  took  their  families  with 
them."  So  far  as  the  Blue  Lodges  of  Missouri  and  the  Emi- 
grant Aid  companies  of  Massachusetts  were  concerned,  their  ob- 
ject was  the  same  and  their  methods  identical.  The  only  differ- 
ence was  that  the  Missourians  were  more  open  and  above-board 
in  their  efforts  to  capture  the  State. 


244  MISSOURI. 

slave  peninsula  jutting  up  into  free  territory,  and  it  was 
assumed,  whether  rightly  or  wrongly  it  matters  not,  that 
this  fact  would  lessen,  if  it  did  not  practically  destroy, 
the  value  of  the  slaves  owned  in  the  State,  by  rendering 
their  possession  insecure.  At  this  time,  Missouri  con- 
tained, on  a  rough  calculation,  about  one  hundred  thou- 
sand of  these  unfortunate  people,  worth,  perhaps,  some 
thirty-five  millions  of  dollars.  Probably  one  half  of 
this  number  were  to  be  fomid  in  the  western  half  of 
the  State ;  and  though  there  was  no  reason  to  suppose 
that  they  would  escape  into  Kansas  any  more  than  they 
had  done  into  Illinois,  Iowa,  or  the  Indian  country,  yet 
the  possibility  of  such  a  contingency,  and  the  feeling  of 
alarm  which  it  created  as  to  the  safety  of  this  kind  of 
property,  were  seized  upon  by  the  small  but  active  band 
of  slavery  propagandists  who  lived  in  the  State,  and 
made  to  do  duty  as  a  reason  why  those  who  wished  to 
preserve  the  "  peculiar  institution  "  should  cross  the 
border  and  endeavor  to  fasten  it  upon  Kansas.  "  If," 
said  Senator  Atchison,  on  the  eve  of  the  territorial  elec- 
tion in  November,  1854,  "a  set  of  fanatics  and  dema- 
gogues, a  thousand  miles  off,  can  afford  to  advance  their 
money  and  exert  every  nerve  to  abolitionize  the  territory 
and  exclude  the  slaveholders  when  they  have  not  the 
least  personal  interest  "  in  so  doing,  how  much  more  is 
it  the  duty  of  those  who  live  within  a  day's  journey  of 
the  territory,  and  whase  peace,  quiet,  and  property  de- 
pend on  the  result,  to  meet  and  counteract  these  efforts 
by  sending  some  hundreds  of  their  young  men  over  the 
border  to  vote  for  their  institutions.  "  Should  each 
county  in  the  vState  only  do  its  duty,"  the  question,  he 
thought,  "  would  be  decided  quietly  and  peaceably  at 
the  ballot-box  ;  "  but   if    they  failed  and  the  territory 


KANSAS   TUUUBLKS.  245 

was  lost  to  slavery,  then,  he  added,  "Missouri  and  the 
other  Southern  States  would  have  shown  themselves  rec- 
reant to  their  interests  and  would  deserve  their  fate." 

From  a  Southern  point  of  view,  this  is  perhaps  as 
strong  a  statement  of  the  case  as  can  be  made,  though 
it  is  in  the  nature  of  a  tu  q\wque  argument,  and  cannot 
be  considered  as  justifying  the  course  of  the  j^ro-slavery 
men,  so  far  as  this  can  be  shown  to  have  been  contrary 
to  law.  It  is  well,  however,  when  condemning  crimes 
against  the  ballot-box,  no  matter  by  whom  committed,  to 
remember  that  in  a  newly  organized  territory  the  con- 
ditions of  citizenship  are  different  from  those  that  pre- 
vail in  old  established  communities.  Tomahawk  claims 
and  such  like  devices,  according  to  the  unwritten  law 
of  the  frontier,  have  always  been  held  to  convey  cer- 
tain rights  as  to  property,  and  inferentially  as  to  citizen- 
ship ;  and  bearing  this  fact  in  mind,  and  having  due 
regard  for  the  saving  effect  of  a  few  days'  presence  in 
the  territory,  it  must  often  have  been  a  difficult  mat- 
ter to  know  whether  a  given  j^erson  was  or  was  not  a 
citizen  within  the  purview  of  the  law.  Certainly,  if 
a  company  of  so-called  northern  emigrants,  in  which 
there  were  two  hundred  and  twenty-five  men  and  only 
five  women,  whose  "  wagons  contained  no  visible  furni- 
ture, agi'icultural  implements  or  mechanical  tools,"  but 
"  abounded  in  all  the  requisite  articles  for  camping  and 
campaigning  purposes,"  were  considered  as  bond  fide 
settlers  and  permitted  to  vote,  there  could  not  have  been 
a  sufficient  reason  for  ruling  out  any  band  of  Missourians 
who  ever  crossed  the  border  and  declared  their  inten- 
tion of  remaining,  even  though  they  left  the  next  day. 

Another  consideration,  but  of  a  purely  political  nature, 
and  having  for  its  object  the  restoration  of  the  equilib- 


246  MISSOURI. 

rlum  between  the  free  and  slave  States  which  had  been 
distui'bed  by  the  admission  of  California,  was  not  with- 
out its  weight.  Its  influence,  it  is  true,  was  but  limited, 
for,  as  yet,  the  circle  of  those  who  recognized  the  full 
significance  of  the  struggle  for  the  possession  of  Kansas 
was  small.  To  the  great  mass  of  the  American  people, 
North  as  well  as  South,  it  was  a  mere  incident  in  the 
contest  for  political  power  which  had  been  going  on  for 
fifty  years  and  more  ;  and  like  all  former  incidents  of 
the  same  kind,  it  was  regarded  as  important  only  so  far 
as  it  might  give  a  temporary  advantage  to  one  or  the 
other  of  the  political  parties  into  which  the  country 
was  divided.  To  shrewd,  far-seeing  politicians  like 
Senator  Atchinson  and  B.  F.  Stringfellow,  it  meant 
much  more.  They  saw  in  it  the  last  peaceful  struggle 
that  the  South  could  make  upon  this  issue,  with  any 
prospect  of  success  ;  for  they  knew,  as  only  one  "  to  the 
manner  born  "  could  know,  that  upon  the  result  in  Kan- 
sas depended  not  only  the  future  of  New  Mexico  and 
Utah,  but  also  of  all  the  rest  of  that  vast  region  which 
the  repeal  of  the  Missouri  Compromise  had  thrown  open 
to  the  Southern  slaveholder  upon  the  same  terms  as 
those  upon  which  it  was  open  to  the  Northern  free-soiler. 
If,  with  all  the  advantages  which  the  proximity  of  Mis- 
souri to  Kansas  gave  them,  they  could  not  secure  that 
territory  to  their  interest,  it  needed  no  prophet  to  tell 
them  that  the  prize  for  which  they  had  so  long  con- 
tended was  lost ;  that  as  parties  were  then  constituted, 
the  struggle  for  political  supremacy  was  ended  ;  and  that 
hereafter,  so  far  as  slavery  was  concerned,  they  would 
have  to  fight  not  for  its  extension  into  new  territories, 
but  for  its  existence  even  in  those  States  in  which  it  had 
the  sanction  of  law. 


KANSAS   TROUBLES.  247 

Powerful  as  these  considerations  must  have  been 
with  a  certain  class,  and  influential  as  that  class  con- 
fessedly was,  by  reason  of  its  wealth  and  intelligence, 
they  do  not  enable  us  to  account  for  the  number  and 
political  complexion  of  the  Missourians  who  crossed 
over  into  Kansas  during  the  year  or  two  succeeding  its 
organization  as  a  territory,  and  in  good  faith  sought  to 
make  a  home  there.  To  do  this  we  shall  have  to  trust 
to  an  entirely  different  order  of  facts,  —  to  one  that  is 
not  only  disconnected  with  the  question  of  slavery,  but 
which  is  at  once  general  in  its  application  and  immedi- 
ate in  its  effects.  Thus,  for  instance,  assuming  with  the 
census  of  February,  1855,  that  the  number  of  qualified 
voters  then  in  the  territory  (a  majority  of  whom  are  ad- 
mitted to  have  been  of  Southern  birth)  was  about  three 
thousand,  it  is  probably  safe  to  say  that  from  one  third 
to  one  half  of  them  had  come  from  Missouri,  though 
they  may  not  all  have  been  natives  of  that  State.  They 
were  not  slaveholders,  or  if  they  were,  they  evidently 
had  not  taken  their  slaves  with  them,  for  to  have  done 
so  would  have  been  to  incur  the  very  risk  which,  as 
owners  of  this  kind  of  property,  they  were  anxious  to 
avoid  ;  but  they  were,  as  a  class,  small  farmers,  —  men 
who  were  not  above  the  necessity  of  doing  their  own 
work  with  their  own  hands,  though  with  a  genuine  An- 
glo-Saxon greed  for  land,  they  either  owned  or  expected 
to  own  the  farms  upon  which  they  lived.  To  state  the 
character  of  the  emigration  in  this  fashion  is  to  suggest 
the  motives  of  those  who  took  part  in  it.  Obviously, 
their  object  was  none  other  than  that  which  had  led 
their  fathers  across  the  Mississippi ;  and  to  any  one 
familiar  with  frontier  life,  it  is  needless  to  say  that  this 
was  the  very  general  though  somewhat  prosaic  desire  of 


248  MISSOURI. 

improving  their  condition.  In  the  older  communities, 
much  of  the  desirable  farming  land  had  been  taken  up, 
and  was  either  in  cultivation,  or  held  for  speculation; 
whilst  Kansas  was,  as  yet,  a  virgin  field,  a  sort  of  prom- 
ised land,  where  farms  could  be  had  at  government 
prices,  and  the  range  was  practically  boundless.  Con- 
siderations of  this  character  have  ever  been  irresistible 
with  a  certain  class  of  borderers,  and  tempted  by  them 
now,  numbers  of  Missouri  farmers,  following  in  the  foot- 
steps of  their  fathers,  joined  the  long  caravan  of  movers, 
and  pitched  their  tents  a  day's  march  farther  west. 

Not  being  slave-owners  even  in  the  restricted  sense 
in  which  that  term  was  used  in  the  border  States,  they 
cannot  be  accused  of  having  any  direct  pecuniary  inter- 
est in  the  extension  of  the  "  peculiar  institution  "  to  their 
new  home.  In  fact,  upon  economic  gromids  it  would 
seem  as  if  they  ought  to  have  been  the  natural  political 
allies  of  the  free-State  men ;  and  yet  such  had  been  the 
effect  produced  by  the  agitation  of  the  slavery  question, 
and  the  short-sighted  action  of  the  more  violent  among 
the  Northern  abolitionists  in  running  off  slaves  and  abus- 
ing all  who  were  interested  in  the  institution,  even  those 
who  only  tolerated  it,  that  they  were,  as  a  rule,  changed 
from  possible  friends  to  actual  enemies.  From  their 
ranks  came  not  a  few  of  those  who  were  most  deter- 
mined to  make  Kansas  in  all  respects  hke  Missouri. 

Of  the  details  of  the  struggle  which  took  place  when 
these  two  opposing  currents  met  it  is  not  necessary  to 
speak.  That  task  has  been  committed  to  another  hand, 
and  from  the  account  which  Mr.  Spring  ^  has  given  of 
those  stirring  times,  it  is  evident  that  the  sins  were  not  aU 
on  the  side  of  those  who  wished  to  make  Kansas  a  slave 
1  ^Q  Kansas,  in  "American  Commonwealths,"  by  L.  W.  Spring. 


KANSAS   TROUBLES.  249. 

State.  To  any  one  conversant  with  the  facts,  this  as- 
surance is  not  necessary,  and  yet  so  generally  and  per- 
sistently have  the  occurrences  of  this  period  been  mis- 
represented that  it  may  not  be  out  of  place  to  intimate 
that  if  all  that  was  ever  charged  against  the  so-called 
border  ruffians  in  the  way  of  illegal  voting  be  admitted, 
it  would  not  justify  the  course  which  the  friends  of  free- 
dom thought  proper  to  pursue  at  this  juncture.  The 
remedy  for  the  evils  of  which  they  complained  was  to  be 
found  at  the  ballot-box,  and  not  in  revolution.  Without 
going  into  the  particulars  of  this  long  and  bloody  strug- 
gle, it  will  be  sufficient  for  my  purpose  to  state  that 
whilst,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  both  parties  were  engaged  in 
the  disreputable  business  of  colonizing  the  territory  with 
voters,  the  legality  of  the  first  election  —  the  one  held 
in  Novembei',  1854  —  was  not  only  not  contested,  but 
the  pro-slavery  delegate  to  Congress,  then  chosen,  was 
permitted  to  take  and  hold  his  seat  without  opposition. 
At  the  next  election,  in  March,  1855,  things  were  very 
different.  It  was  attended  with  more  or  less  violence 
and  intimidation,  and  there  seems  to  be  no  doubt  that, 
in  this  case,  the  Missourians  or  pro-slavery  men  were 
the  chief,  but  not  the  only  sinners.  At  all  events  they 
polled  the  most  votes,  more  it  is  said  than  there  were 
voters  in  the  territory,  and  elected  an  overwhelming 
majority  of  their  candidates  to  the  territorial  legislature, 
even  after  ruling  out  the  six  whose  seats  were  contested, 
and  two  others,  against  whose  election  there  was  no  pro- 
test, but  to  whom  Governor  Reeder  also  refused  certif- 
icates. This  purgation,  sweeping  as  it  was,  did  not 
satisfy  the  free-State  men.  On  second  thoughts,  and 
for  obvious  reasons,  they  now  wished  the  whole  election 
to  be  set  aside  ;  but  to  this  neither  the  territorial  au- 


250  MISSOURI. 

thorlties  nor  Congress  were  willing  to  accede.^  Fall- 
ing in  their  efforts  to  bring  this  about,  the  anti-slavery 
party  set  up  an  opposition  legislature,  and  endeavored, 
by  force  and  usurpation,  to  overthrow  the  government 
which  had  been  regularly  established  over  them.  In 
taking  this  course,  instead  of  submitting  their  cause  to 
the  arbitrament  of  the  ballot-box,  they  not  only  gave 
good  grounds  for  doubting  the  truth  of  their  oft-repeated 
statement  as  to  the  preponderance  of  population  in 
their  favor,  but  they  placed  themselves  outside  of  the 
law,  and  therefore  clearly  and  hopelessly  in  the  wrong. 
Had  they  succeeded,  it  would  have  resulted,  as  Presi- 
dent Buchanan  well  and  truly  said,  in  establishing  a 
revolutionary  government  in  place  of  the  one  "  pre- 
scribed and  recognized  by  Congress,"  ^  and  would  have 
been  "  a  usurpation  of  the  same  character  as  it  would 
be  if  a  portion  of  the  people  of  a  State  were  to  under- 
take to  establish  a  separate  government  within  its  char- 
tered limits,  for  the  purpose  of  redressing  any  grievance, 
real  or  imaginary,"  of  which  they  thought  they  had  a 
right  to  complain.  "  Such  a  principle,"  he  added,  "  if 
carried  into  execution,  would  destroy  all  lawful  author- 
ity and  produce  universal  anarchy,"  and  yet,  new  as  the 
fact  may  be  to  some  of  us,  this  is  precisely  what  the 
free-State  men  of  Kansas  and  their  friends  and  allies  in 
the  North  tried  to  accomplish. 

^  .  .  .  At  the  time  I  entered  upon  my  official  duties  ' '  (March 
1857),  "  Congress  had  recognized  this  legislature  in  different  forms 
and  hy  different  enactments.  The  delegate  elected  to  the  House 
of  Representatives,  imder  a  territorial  law,  had  just  completed 
his  term  of  service  on  the  day  previous  to  my  inauguration.  In 
fact,  I  found  the  government  of  Kansas  as  well  established  as  that 
of  any  other  territory."  —  Buchanan'' s  Administration,  p.  31.  New 
York,  18G6. 

-  Buchanan'' s  Administration,  chapter  ii.      New  York,  18G6. 


KANSAS    TROUBLES.  251 

With  such  a  beginning,  it  was  inevitable  that  evil 
should  follow.  The  difficulty,  not  to  say  impossibility, 
of  enforcing  the  processes  of  the  courts,  United  States 
as  well  as  territorial,  in  Lawrence  and  other  portions 
of  the  territory  where  the  friends  of  freedom  held  sway, 
naturally  gave  rise  to  an  era  of  lawlessness ;  and  in  the 
saturnalia  that  then  prevailed,  the  "  jayhawkers,"  as 
those  who  took  to  robbery  in  the  interest  of  anti-slavery 
were  called,  are  said  to  have  been  "  the  superior  devils."  ^ 
In  the  long  list  of  crimes  attributed  to  them,  illegal  vot- 
ing, the  one  offense  of  which  the  free-State  men  com- 
plained most  bitterly,  and  which  it  was  therefore  natural 
to  suppose  they  would  have  avoided,  certainly  holds  a 
place  ;  and  it  was  reserved  for  John  Brown  to  inaugurate 
the  system  of  murder  for  opinion's  sake,  by  the  assassi- 
nation of  five  peaceable  settlers  on  the  Pottowatamie,  ap- 
parently for  no  better  reason  than  because  they  differed 
from  him  upon  the  question  of  slavery,  and  he  thought 
an  example  necessary.^ 

^  Kansas,  by  Leverett  W.  Spring,  p.  256.     Boston,  1885. 

-  ' '  Measured  by  the  scale  of  the  times,  the  five  squatters  on 
whom  he  laid  a  tiger's  paw  were  not  exceptionally  bad  men."  — 
Spring's  Kansas,  p.  147.  "  I  became  satisfied  from  new  and  con- 
clusive evidence  that  these  men  were  innocent  of  all  crime  or 
threatened  crime,  and  that  their  taking  off  was  not  intended  for 
the  protection  of  free-State  men  from  their  outrages  and  such  as 
theirs,  but  was  intended  by  Brown  as  an  act  of  offensive  war."  — 
Governor  Charles  Robinson,  in  a  letter  dated  Lawrence,  July  22, 
1884,  and  published  in  the  Boston  Transcript  of  August  15th. 
Any  one  desirous  of  further  information  upon  this  point,  or  as  to 
Brown's  career  in  Kansas,  will  do  well  to  consult  Reminiscences  of 
Old  John  Brown,  a  pamphlet  published  atRockford,  111.,  in  1880. 
The  author,  Dr.  George  W.  Brown,  was  the  editor  of  the  Kansas 
Herald  of  Freedom,  and  one  of  the  most  active  men  of  that  time 
on  that  side.  The  Life  of  John  Brown,  by  F.  B.  Sanborn,  may 
also  be  read  to  ad%'anta<re. 


252  MISSOURI. 

During  all  these  troublous  years,  it  is  a  noteworthy 
fact  that  the  pro-slavery  men  of  the  territory,  what- 
ever may  have  been  their  sins  as  individuals,  were,  as 
a  jiarty,  uniformly  to  be  found  supporting  the  govern- 
ment.^ Even  upon  those  occasions  when,  reinforced  by 
their  friends  and  neighbors  from  Missouri,  they  are  said 
to  have  invested,  or  beleaguered,  or  sacked  Lawrence, 
they  were  serving  as  a  j)osse  comitatus,  summoned  by 
the  regularly  constituted  authorities  of  the  territory  ^  to 
aid  in  enforcing  the  laws. 

With  Kansas  in  a  state  of  anarchy,  it  was  impossible 
that  the  peoi3le  in  the  adjoining  counties  of  Missouri 
should  not  suffer.  Compared  with  their  neighbors  on 
the  other  side  of  the  border,  they  were  old  settlers,  and 
as  they  had  accumulated  more  or  less  property  they  of 
course  had  something  to  lose,  which  is  more  than  can  be 
truthfully  said  of  most  of  the  new-comers.  This  fact 
the  "  jayhawkers  •"  were  not  slow  to  learn,  and  as  they 
cared  as  little  for  state  lines  as  they  did  for  law,  they 
soon  began  their  freebooting  inroads  into  the  more 
thinly  populated  counties  south  of  the  Missouri,  taking 
whatever  they  could  conveniently  carry  off.  One  of 
these  raids  was  headed  by  John  Brown,  and  it  is  memo- 
rable as  being  his  last  appearance  in  Kansas  affairs.  It 
took  place  in  December,  1858,  and  resulted  in  the  de- 
struction of  considerable  property,  the  liberation  of  eleven 
slaves,  and  the  death,  but  not  by  the  hands  of  Brown's 
immediate  party,  of  a  slave-owner,  who  seems  to  have  ob- 

^  "  Whilst  the  pro-slavery  party  in  the  territory  sustained  the 
government  in  all  its  branches  which  had  been  established  over  it 
by  Congress,  the  anti-slavery  party  repudiated  it."  — Buchanan' s 
Administration,  p.  29.     New  York,  1866. 

'^  Spring's  Katisas,  pp.  91,  118,  189,  197;  Sanborn's  Life  of 
John  Brown,  pp.  210,  'Zo-i. 


KANSAS   TROUBLES.  253 

jected  to  the  way  in  which  it  was  proposed  to  dispossess 
him  of  his  property.  This  raid,  coming  as  it  did  soon 
after  the  joint  attempt  of  the  governors  of  Missouri  and 
Kansas  to  hring  ahout  a  pacification  of  the  frontier, 
created  great  excitement  in  the  former  State,  where  it 
was  made  the  basis  of  legislative  action  at  the  meeting 
of  the  General  Assembly,  which  took  place  in  the  Janu- 
ary following.  During  the  course  of  that  session,  Gov- 
ernor Stewart  sent  in  several  messages,  in  which  he 
called  attention  to  this  outrage  and  urged  that  measures 
be  taken  to  protect  the  people  of  that  portion  of  the  State 
from  further  trouble.  Accompanying  one  of  these  mes- 
sages were  memorials  from  thirty-five  citizens  of  Bates 
and  Vernon  counties,  in  which  they  gave  accounts  of 
crimes  that  had  been  perpetrated  in  their  neighborhoods 
by  organized  bands  of  robbers  from  Kansas,  and  asked 
that  a  sufficient  force  be  sent  to  the  border  to  defend 
"  peaceable  and  law-abiding  citizens  from  insult,  outrage, 
and  lawless  violence." 

In  accordance  with  this  request,  a  bill  was  prepared 
and  introduced  into  the  Senate,  where  it  was  favorably 
received.  When  the  measure  came  up  in  the  House, 
it  was  referred  to  the  committee  on  federal  relations, 
and  in  due  time  it  elicited  from  that  body  a  report, 
which  is  well  described  by  a  recent  writer  as  being  a 
"  singularly  dispassionate  and  sensible  document."  In 
it,  the  committee,  after  referring  to  the  delicate  relations 
that  must  exist  between  States  which  are  separated  only  by 
an  imaginary  line,  and  to  the  fact  that  the  borders  of 
counties,  so  separated,  are  the  favorite  resorts  of  banditti 
and  desperadoes,  go  on  to  say  :  — 

"  We  do  not  doubt  that  at  least  ninety-nine  out  of 
every  hundred  of  the  citizens  of    Kansas    deplore    the 


254  MISSOURI. 

events  under  consideration.  .  .  .  The  people  of  Kansas 
and  Missouri  are  most  intimately  connected,  not  only  by 
geographical  lines,  but  by  the  tender  cords  of  kindred. 
We  ai'B  the  same  people,  impelled  by  the  same  interest, 
and  bound  by  the  same  manifest  destiny.  .  .  .  Even  if 
this  difficulty  be  vv^inked  at  by  Kansas  ...  we  would 
earnestly  recommend  the  trial  of  every  honorable  means 
of  reconciliation  before  a  resort  to  extreme  measures. 
...  If  ...  an  army  be  stationed  along  the  line  of  our 
frontier  for  the  avowed  pui-pose  of  protecting  our  border 
from  incursions  from  a  neighboring  territory  .  .  .  Mis- 
souri .  .  .  might  well  expect  other  States  on  our  border 
to  act  on  the  line  of  the  same  suicidal  jjolicy  .  .  .  and 
the  fraternal  feeling  that  is  not  now  circumscribed  by 
state  lines,  would  be  rent  asunder,  and  we  would  meet 
our  brothers  from  our  sister  States  as  aliens  and 
enemies." 

"  This  bill,"  it  was  further  objected,  "  provides  that 
these  troops  are  to  be  raised  from  the  counties  on  the 
border  ;  taken  from  the  midst  of  a  people  ah'eady  exas- 
perated by  the  murder  and  robbing  of  their  kindred  and 
neighbors.  Companies  formed  out  of  such  material 
would  be  hard  to  restrain  from  acts  of  summary  pun- 
ishment, should  any  of  these  desperadoes  fall  into  their 
hands ;  and  it  would  likewise  be  difficult  to  teach 
such  troops  the  line  of  our  jurisdiction,  and,  in  the  ex- 
citement of  inflicting  a  merited  punishment  on  some 
offender,  it  would  be  hard  for  them  to  comprehend  the 
deplorable  evils  attending  an  armed  invasion  of  a  sis- 
ter territory  by  the  militia  of  a  State.  .  .  .  Your  com- 
mittee," it  is  added,  "are  not  insensible  of  the  obli- 
gations of  the  State  to  protect  all  her  citizens,  .  .  . 
but  .  .  .^we  are  most  unwilling  that  the  State  should 


KANSAS    TROUBLES.  255 

run  wild  in  the  remedies  applied  We  have  evidence  of 
the  most  satisfactory  character  that  outrages,  almost 
without  a  parallel  in  America,  at  least,  have  been  jier- 
petrated  upon  the  persons  and  jiroperty  of  unoffending 
citizens  of  Bates  and  Vernon  counties, — their  houses 
2)lundered  and  then  burned,  their  negroes  kidnapped  in 
droves,  citizens  wounded  and  murdered  in  cold  blood, 
—  which  evils  demand  at  our  hands  the  best  remedy  the 
wisdom  of  the  legislature  can  apply."  In  conclusion, 
they  decline  to  recommend  the  use  of  a  military  force, 
but  tliey  advise  that  rewards  should  be  offered  for  the 
arrest  of  the  jayhawking  leaders,  and  that  circuit  judges 
should  hold  special  terms  in  the  disturbed  districts,  for 
the  purpose  of  investigating  grievances  and  adopting 
measm'es  for  the  arrest  of  all  offenders.  A  bill  to  this 
effect  was  accordingly  passed  ;  and  by  way  of  affording 
additional  security  to  the  people  of  the  threatened  coun- 
ties, the  governor  was  authorized  to  use  his  discretion 
in  the  adoption  of  such  measures  as  he  might  deem  nec- 
essary for  their  protection,  and  a  special  approjiriation 
of  thirty  thousand  dollars  was  made  to  enable  him  to 
carry  out  this  purpose.  In  accordance  with  this  law,  a  re- 
ward of  three  thousand  dollars  was  offered  for  the  arrest 
of  Brown,  but  it  was  of  no  avail.  He  succeeded  in  pilot- 
ing his  little  band  of  fugitive  slaves  to  a  place  of  safety 
in  Canada,  and  then  returned  to  Ohio,  where  he  sold  the 
horses  he  had  stolen,  though  we  are  told,  with  what  may 
be  an  attempt  at  humor,  that  he  "  warned  the  purchasers 
of  a  possible  defect  in  the  title."  ^ 

With  this  successful  foray,  John  Brown's  career  in 
Kansas  and  on  the  border  came  to  an  end.     On  each 
of  his  visits  to  the  territory,  his  path  had  been  marked 
^  Sanborn's  Life  of  John  Brown,  p.  494. 


256  MISSOURI. 

with  blood ;  and  yet,  except  in  the  little  town  o£  Tabor, 
Iowa,  which  had  been  one  of  his  favorite  haunts  when 
Kansas  became  "  too  hot  to  hold  him,"  his  course  does  not 
appear  to  have  called  forth  a  word  of  protest  from  his 
Northern  admirers.  Instead  of  meting  out  to  him  the 
treatment  due  to  a  monomaniac  or  a  fugitive  from  jus- 
tice, they  received  him  as  a  sort  of  popular  hero.  His 
murders  were  either  denied  or  justified ;  the  attempts 
which  he  and  his  friends  successfully  made  to  resist  ar- 
rest were  characterized  as  battles,  and  philanthropic 
gentlemen  were  found  in  Boston  and  elsewhere,  who  did 
not  hesitate  to  suj^ply  him  Avith  "  material  aid,"  though 
they  must  have  known  that  in  the  schemes  in  which  he 
was  engaged,  robbery  certainly,  and  probably  murder, 
were  essential  to  success.  In  their  sympathy  for  ''bleed- 
ing "  Kansas  — made  so  by  crimes  for  which  they  were 
largely  responsible  —  they  seem  to  have  forgotten  that 
even  in  as  good  a  cause  as  a  crusade  to  prevent  the  for- 
mation of  another  slave  State,  the  end  did  not  justify  the 
means. ^ 

For  some  time  after  this  action  of  the  Missouri  offi- 
cials, and  in  consequence,  also,  of  the  exertions  of  the 
federal  and  territorial  authorities,  a  condition  of  com- 
parative peace  was  established  on  the  frontier.     It  did 

^  Some  idea  of  the  state  of  feeling  that  prevailed  in  certain 
quarters  may  be  inferred  from  the  following  statement  of  Mr. 
F.  B.  Sanhorn,  published  in  the  Boston  Transcript  of  December 
6,  1884:  "  I  myself  heard  a  Massachusetts  man,  high  in  the  con- 
fidence of  Mr.  La\VTence,  propose  (in  the  rooms  of  the  Emigrant 
Aid  Company  in  Winter  Street,  Boston,  a  few  days  after  Buchan- 
an's election,  November,  1856),  that  men  should  be  sent  out  to 
disjjatch  Stringf  ellow  and  Atchison,  leaders  of  the  border  ruffians 
in  Missouri.  No  one  responded  to  the  suggestion,  but  it  was 
seriously  made."' 


KANSAS   TROUBLES.  257 

not  last  long,  as  the  decline  of  guerilla  life  was  apparent 
rather  than  real.  In  Novemher,  1860,  another  outbreak 
occurred,  in  which  the  United  States  court  for  the  third 
Kansas  disti-ict  was  broken  up  by  a  band  of  "  jayhawk- 
ers,"  under  the  lead  of  Montgomery,  and  the  United 
States  officers,  including  the  judge  himself,  "  were  obliged 
to  fly  for  their  lives."  A  grand  juror  by  the  name  of 
Moore  was  murdered,  as  were  Samuel  Scott  and  Rus- 
sell Hindes,  the  latter  a  citizen  of  Missouri. 

The  crime  of  which  they  were  accused,  according  to 
a  paper  found  in  Hindes'  pocket  after  death,  consisted 
in  being  engaged  (in)  hunting  and  kidnapjiing  negroes 
in  1859.  In  other  words,  they  were  hung  because  they 
had  aided  in  capturing  a  runaway  slave,  as  it  was  clearly 
their  right  to  do  under  a  law  which,  however  objection- 
able in  some  of  its  features,  did  not  differ  in  its  end  and 
aim  from  one  that  had  been  passed  in  1793,  and  had  re- 
ceived the  approving  signature  of  Washington  himself. 
Naturally  enough  these  proceedings  caused  much  alarm 
along  the  border,  and  more  particularly  as  they  were 
indorsed  by  a  so-called  convention  of  Linn  and  Bour- 
bon counties,  Kansas,  and  were  backed  by  the  declara- 
tion of  Montgomery  that  he  intended  "  to  keep  posses- 
sion of  Fort  Scott  and  other  places  near  the  state  line, 
to  prevent  '  a  fire  in  the  rear,'  while  he  cleaned  out 
southern  Missouri  of  its  slaves."  ^ 

When  the  report  of  these  proceedings,  somewhat  ex- 
aggerated, perhaps,  so  far  as  it  related  to  the  invasion 

1  Our  authority,  Judge  Williams  of  the  United  States  District 
Court,  adds  that  "  .so  far,  he  has  carried  out  literally  his  declared 
programme,"  and  "the  citizens  of  Missouri  on  the  Osage,  Mar- 
maton,  and  in  Bates  and  Vernon,  are  flying  from  their  homes 
into  the  interior." 


258  MISSOURI. 

of  the  State,  reached  Jefferson  City,  Governor  Stewart 
ordered  Brigadier-General  D.  M.  Frost  to  proceed  at 
once  to  the  border  with  men  enough  to  end  the  difficulty. 
This  order  reached  St.  Louis  on  the  23d  of  Novembei", 
1860,  and  in  less  than  forty-eight  hours  a  force  of  six  hun- 
dred and  thirty  men  was  on  the  way  to  the  scene  of  the 
out-break.  Upon  reaching  the  frontier,  which  they  did 
early  in  December,  they  found  that  General  Harney  of 
the  regular  army  had  already  arrived  at  Fort  Scott ;  and 
when  Montgomery  saw  himself  threatened  by  both  fed- 
eral and  state  troops,  he  abandoned  his  fort,  disbanded 
his  men,  and  temporarily  left  the  county.  In  a  report 
made  after  his  return  to  St.  Louis,  General  Frost  sub- 
mitted a  number  of  affidavits,  from  which  it  appears 
that  "  Hindes  was  taken  from  the  midst  of  an  indigent 
and  dependent  family  .  .  .  and  hanged  to  death  for  no 
other  crime,  than  that  he  had  been  faithful  to  the  laws 
and  institutions  of  his  State."  General  Frost  further 
states  "  that  the  deserted  and  charred  remains  of  once 
happy  homes,  combined  with  the  general  terror  that 
prevailed  amongst  the  citizens  who  still  clung  to  their 
possessions,  gave  but  too  certain  proof  of  the  persecution 
to  which  they  had  all  been  subjected,  and  which  they 
would  again  have  to  endure,  with  renewed  violence,  so 
soon  as  armed  protection  should  be  withdrawn."  In 
view  of  this  condition  of  affairs,  and  in  order  to  carry 
out  fully  Governor  Stewart's  order  "  to  repel  invasions 
and  restore  peace  to  the  border,"  Frost  determined  to 
leave  a  considerable  force  in  the  threatened  district. 
Accordingly,  a  battalion  of  volunteers,  consisting  of 
three  companies  of  rangers  and  one  of  artillery,  was 
enlisted,  and  Lieutenant-Colonel  John  S.  Bowen,  who 
afterwards  rose  to  high  rank  in  the  Confederate  service, 
was  chosen  to  the  command. 


PROGRESS   OF  THE  STATE.  259 

With  the  organization  of  this  force,  and  perhaps 
owing  also,  in  some  degree,  to  the  inclemency  of  the 
season,  "  jayhavrking,"  as  such,  came  to  an  end,  though 
the  thing  itself,  during  the  first  two  or  three  years  of 
the  civil  war,  and,  in  fact,  as  long  as  there  was  anything 
left  on  the  Missouri  side  of  the  horder  worth  taking,  flour- 
ished more  vigorously  than  ever.  The  old  jayhawking 
leaders,  however,  now  came  with  United  States  commis- 
sions in  their  pockets  and  at  the  head  of  regularly  en- 
listed troops,  in  which  guise  they  carried  on  a  system  of 
robbery  and  murder  that  left  a  good  portion  of  the 
frontier  south  of  the  Missouri  River  as  perfect  a  waste 
as  Germany  was  at  the  end  of  the  Thirty  Years'  War. 

Notwithstanding  the  condition  of  semi-hostility  that 
jirevailed  upon  her  western  border  during  a  great  part 
of  the  time,  the  progress  of  Missouri  in  wealth  and 
po2)ulation  during  the  ten  years  that  intervened  between 
1850  and  1860  was  satisfactory.  From  being  the  thir- 
teenth in  the  sisterhood  of  States,  in  point  of  numbers, 
she  had  grown  to  be  the  eighth,  and  in  this  respect,  at 
least,  she  was  at  the  head  of  the  Southern  States.  In 
other  words,  she  now  had  within  her  borders  a  popula- 
tion of  one  million  one  hundred  and  eighty-two  thou- 
sand as  against  six  hundred  and  eighty-two  thousand 
in  1850  ;  a  rate  of  increase,  we  may  remark  in  pass- 
ing, which  is  hardly  reconcilable  with  the  theory  that 
emigration  always  shunned  the  regions  where  slavery 
existed.  Of  this  whole  population  one  hundred  and  fif- 
teen thousand  were  slaves,  about  twenty-seven  thousand 
more  than  were  reported  in  the  census  of  1850.  As- 
suming these  two  enumerations  to  have  been  correct,  it 
will  give  an  increase  of  about  thirty-one  per  cent,  for 
the  ten  years,  a  fraction  over  three  per  cent,  per  an- 


200  MISSOURI. 

num,  only  about  one  third  the  rate  at  which  the  whites 
had  advanced  during  tlie  same  period.  Under  the  cir- 
cumstances tliis  increase  in  the  number  of  blacks  is  a 
noteworthy  fact,  not  so  much  on  account  of  the  per- 
centage of  growth  which  it  indicates,  as  for  the  insight 
which  it  gives  us  into  the  condition  of  public  opinion 
in  the  State.  Thus,  for  instance,  if  we  compare  this 
rate  of  increase  with  the  progress  in  numbers  made 
by  this  ill-fated  people  during  the  several  decades  that 
had  elapsed  since  the  organization  of  Missouri  as  a  ter- 
ritory, it  will  be  seen  that  there  is  a  marked  falling 
off.  This  has  been  construed,  and  no  doubt  correctly, 
as  foreshadowing  the  fate  that  would  ultimately  have 
befallen  the  "  peculiar  institution  "  if  it  had  been  left  to 
the  action  of  natural  causes.  It  may  even  be  taken 
as  an  indication  that  the  process  of  its  gradual  extinc- 
tion in  the  State  was  already  well  under  way  ;  but  if, 
on  the  other  hand,  we  limit  ourselves  to  the  considera- 
tion of  the  actual  increase  in  the  number  of  slaves  dur- 
ing this  interval,  without  reference  to  any  previous  period, 
it  will  be  found  to  suggest  a  different  order  of  facts. 
Viewed  in  this  light,  it  tells  us  in  no  doubtful  terms 
that,  up  to  this  time,  but  few  of  these  people  had  been 
sent  South,  as  they  would  have  been  if  such  a  course  had 
been  deemed  necessary  to  their  retention  as  slaves,  and  m 
it  justifies  the  inference  that  the  great  mass  of  the  " 
people  of  the  State  still  looked  forward  to  a  peaceable 
solution  of  the  difficulties  between  the  North  and  the 
South,  which  now  began  to  take  a  most  portentous  shape.  , 
Another  fact  of  much  economic  and,  as  we  shall  see  ■ 
later  on,  of  no  little  political  importance  that  may  be 
gathered  from  a  study  of  the  census  returns  is  to  be 
found  in  the    number   of   foreiffn-born    emigrants  that 


mo  OR  ESS    OF    THE   STATE.  2G1 

were  then  in  the  State.  According  to  the  reports  of 
1860,  they  amounted  to  one  hundred  and  sixty  thousand 
—  almost  a  seventh  of  the  entire  population  ;  and  of 
this  number  eighty-eight  thousand  were  Germans,  whilst 
the  Irish,  who  came  next,  had  but  forty-three  thousand- 
The  revolutions  of  1848  and  the  unsettled  condition  of 
continental  Eurojje  for  some  years  afterwards,  taken  in 
connection  with  the  failure  of  the  potato  crops  in  1846-47 
and  the  consequent  famine  in  Ireland,  will  no  doubt  ac- 
count for  much  of  the  emigration  that  took  place  dur- 
ing this  period ;  and  when  once  these  new-comers  had 
landed  on  our  shores,  the  central  position  and  temperate 
climate,  to  say  nothing  of  the  agricultural  and  commer- 
cial advantages  which  Missouri  held  out  to  those  in 
seai-ch  of  a  home  and  a  livelihood,  will  go  far  towards 
explaining  the  favor  with  which  the  State  was  generally 
regarded.  Although  not  in  receipt  of  the  heaviest  con- 
tingent of  these  new  arrivals,  yet  she  had  no  reason  to 
be  dissatisfied  with  the  number  or  character  of  those  of 
them  who  found  homes  within  her  hospitable  borders. 
Compared  with  Ohio,  Illinois,  or  even  Wisconsin,  she 
certainly  lagged  behind,  but  among  the  other  States  of 
the  West  and  Northwest  she  was  easily  first. 

Contrary  to  the  jjractice  of  immigrants  generally,  a 
number  of  these  new-comers,  especially  among  the  Ger- 
mans, turned  their  attention  to  farming  and  market- 
gardening,  and  established  themselves  on  small  hold- 
ings near  the  cities  and  towns  ;  or  else,  going  into  the 
country,  they  might  have  been  found  on  little  farms,  and 
usually  in  isolated  communities,  whole  townships  in  por- 
tions of  the  State  being  taken  up  with  their  settlements. 
Being  industrious  and  frugal,  they  soon  came  to  own 
the  farms  on  which  they  lived,  and  were   thus  pecu- 


2G2  MISSOURI. 

niarily  indeijendent.  To  this  extent;  and  so  far  as 
they  ijroved  themselves  to  be  law-abiding  and,  when  the 
crisis  came,  patriotic,  they  may  be  said  to  have  been  a 
valuable  addition  to  the  population.  From  a  political 
point  of  view,  however,  it  may  well  be  questioned 
whether  they  did  not  show  themselves  to  be  possessed  of 
certain  characteristics  which  made  them  less  desirable 
as  citizens  than  were  the  emigrants  from  other  portions 
of  Europe,  who  were  not  gifted  with  their  prudent  fore- 
sight, but  who  were  more  easily  assimilated.  Leading 
the  isolated  lives  tliey  did,  they  were  not  open  to  out- 
side influences,  and  this,  of  course,  had  a  tendency  to 
keep  them  separate  and  apart  from  the  rest  of  the  com- 
munity, and  it  also  aggravated  the  natural  tenacity  with 
which  they  clung  to  the  language,  the  manners  and  cus- 
toms, and  habits  of  thought  which  they  brought  from 
the  "  fatherland."  Indeed,  they  may  be  said  to  have 
had  in  an  eminent  degree,  as  they  still  have,  the  defects 
of  their  virtues.  The  very  strength  of  race  which  has 
made  the  Anglo-Saxon  the  virtual  owner  of  a  large  part 
of  the  habitable  globe,  and  which  he  inherited  from  his 
German  ancestors,  may  upon  occasion  prove  a  source  of 
discord  and  an  element  of  danger  in  so  far  as  it  pre- 
vents the  German  emigrant  of  to-day  from  becoming 
thoroughly  and  speedily  Americanized. 

Great  as  was  tlie  progress  of  the  State  in  population, 
it  was  more  than  equaled  by  her  increase  in  wealth. 
According  to  the  official  reports,  the  estimated  value  of 
the  property,  real  and  personal,  for  the  year  1860  was 
8501,214.398  as  against  §137,247,707  in  1850,  an  in- 
crease  of  about  265  per  cent.  This  is  believed  to  be 
too  great,  as  the  valuation  of  1850  was  low  ;  but  eA^en 
if  we  add  to  that  estimate  fifty  millions  of  dollars,  it 


PROGRESS    OF   THE  STATE.  263 

will  still  give  very  satisfactory  results.  Of  the  whole 
amount,  the  fai-ms  are  put  clown  as  being  worth  some 
two  hundred  and  thirty  millions,  and  this  is  probably 
not  far  from  their  actual  value,  as,  up  to  that  date, 
twenty-one  millions  of  acres  had  been  taken  up,  over 
six  millions  of  which  were  in  cultivation.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  manufactured  products  were  estimated  at  only 
about  forty-two  millions  of  dollars,  the  original  plants, 
or  capital  invested,  being  rated  at  half  that  sum. 

Of  this  latter  amount  but  a  small  fraction  was  em- 
ployed in  mining  and  kindred  pursuits,  though  the  geo- 
logical survey  of  the  State  had  shown  that  her  stores  of 
mineral  wealth  were  practically  inexhaustible,  and  that 
they  were  so  situated  witli  reference  to  each  other  and 
to  a  market  as  to  promise  favorable  returns  ujion  any 
efforts  that  might  be  made  to  develop  them.  This  sur- 
vey, it  is  true,  was  not  yet  finished,  but  enough  had 
been  done  to  show  that  of  the  sixty-nine  thousand 
square  miles  composing  the  total  area  of  the  State, 
fourteen  thousand  were  underlaid  by  workable  beds  of 
coal ;  that  more  than  one  thousand  valuable  veins  of 
lead,  and  half  as  many  of  iron,  had  been  discovered  and 
partly  traced,  besides  many  of  zinc,  copper,  hydraulic 
limestones,  and  mineral  paints. 

It  had  also  been  demonstrated  that  "  that  portion  of 
the  State  south  of  the  Osage  River,  once  considered  by 
the  superficial  observer  as  almost  worthless,  has  a  soil 
(rocky  and  broken  as  it  is)  and  a  climate  wonderfully 
adapted  to  the  grape  and  other  valuable  fruits."  Of 
the  forty -four  millions  of  acres  of  land  in  the  State, 
there  were  only  about  three  millions,  and  these  mainly 
in  the  swamp  region  of  the  southeast,  that  did  not 
promise  plenteous  returns  to  careful  and  intelligent  hus- 


264:  MISSOURI. 

bandiy.  All  the  grains,  grasses,  fruits,  and  vegetables 
that  are  adapted  to  a  fertile  soil  and  temperate  climate, 
to  say  nothing  of  such  products  as  tobacco,  hemp,  and 
even  cotton,  were  cultivated  to  advantage  ;  and  upon 
the  broad  prairies  and  in  the  fertile  valleys  of  the  State 
countless  herds  and  droves  of  domestic  animals  found 
abundant  food  and  shelter. 

Such,  in  fine,  was  the  condition  of  Missouri  on  the 
31st  of  December,  1860,  when  the  twenty-first  General 
Assembly  of  the  State  began  its  first  session  at  Jefferson 
City.  This  body,  consisting  in  the  Senate  of  twenty- 
five  Democrats,  seven  Bell-Everett  (Compromise  Union) 
men,  and  one  Republican,  and,  in  the  House,  of  eighty- 
three  Democrats,  thirty-seven  Bell-Everett  men,  and 
twelve  Republicans,  had  been  chosen  at  the  election 
which  took  place  in  the  preceding  August ;  and,  speak- 
ing without  reference  to  the  question  of  secession,  it 
may  be  said  to  have  been  fairly  representative  of  the 
political  parties  in  the  State  as  they  had  shown  them- 
selves to  be  at  the  presidential  election  in  November  of 
that  year.  Of  the  165,000  votes  then  cast,  Lincoln  re- 
ceived 17,028;  Bell  and  Everett,  58,372;  and  the 
Democrats  had  the  rest.  Their  vote,  however,  was  di- 
vided l)etween  Breckinridge  and  Douglas,  the  former  of 
whom  received  31,317  votes,  whilst  the  latter,  with  a  fol- 
lowing of  58,801,  obtained  the  electoral  vote  of  the  State. 
In  attempting  to  carry  our  classification  still  further,  and 
distinguish  between  the  two  wings  of  the  Democratic 
party,  the  Breckini'idge  men,  or  rather  those  who  after- 
wards became  such  (for  at  the  time  of  their  election 
this  issue  was  not  sharply  drawn),  may  be  set  down  as 
being  States'  rights  men,  and  there  can  be  no  doubt 
that,  when  the   time  came   for  a  decision,  the   leaders 


ELECTION  OF  18C0.  265 

amongst  them,  and  not  a  few  of  the  rank  and  tile,  cast 
their  lot  in  with  the  South  ;  but  to  speak  of  them  as 
being  secessionists,  meaning  thereby  that  they  were  in 
favor  of  an  immediate  dissolution  of  the  Union  at  any 
and  every  cost,  would  be  gross  injustice.  Probably  at 
this  time,  although  it  was  ten  days  after  South  Carolina 
liad  seceded,  there  was  not  a  handful  of  people  in  the 
State  who  did  not  believe,  with  Senators  Crittenden  and 
Douglas,  that  the  difficulty  wovdd  be  settled  by  a  com- 
promise of  some  sort,  and  without  an  appeal  to  arms. 
Of  secessionists  proper,  using  the  term  in  the  sense  we 
have  given  to  it,  there  was  not  a  corporal's  guard  in  the 
whole  State. 

But  whilst  this  statement  is  believed  to  be  substan- 
tially true,  it  would  be  a  grave  mistake  to  suppose  that 
the  people  of  Missouri  were  in  sympathy  with  the  posi- 
tion which  the  triumphant  Republicans  of  the  North 
now  occupied,  or  with  the  long  course  of  action,  legisla- 
tive and  otherwise,  that  had  led  to  it.  So  far  were  they 
from  anything  of  the  kind,  that  they  held  the  Republi- 
can party  responsible  for  the  condition  in  which  the 
country  was  placed,  and  in  proof  of  it  they  referred  to 
the  continued  interference,  in  Congress  and  out  of  it, 
with  the  institution  of  slaveiy ;  to  the  repeated  attempts 
to  deprive  the  people  of  the  South  of  their  constitu- 
tional rights  in  and  to  the  territories  that  should  have 
been  common  to  all ;  and  they  pointed  to  the  fact  that, 
at  this  very  time,  fourteen  out  of  the  seventeen  free 
States  had  upon  their  statute-books  laws  which  were 
intended  not  only  to  nullify  the  act  of  Congress  for  the 
return  of  fugitive  slaves,  but  were  in  direct  violation  of 
an  express  mandate  of  the  Constitution. 

With  such  facts  staring  them  in  the  face,  it  was  not 


266  MISSOURI. 

possible  for  the  people  of  the  State  to  shut  their  eyes 
to  the  aggressive  spirit  which  the  North  —  except,  per- 
haps, in  the  one  case  of  the  repeal  of  the  Missouri 
Compromise  —  had  manifested  when  dealing  with  any 
proposition  that  looked  to  an  increase  in  the  number 
of  slave  States ;  nor  could  they  forget  the  declai'ations 
of  Lincoln  and  other  leaders  of  the  Republican  party 
that  "  a  house  divided  against  itself  must  fall,"  and  that 
"  this  country  could  not  permanently  endure  half  slave 
and  half  free."  Clearly,  if  these  were  the  sentiments  of 
the  Northern  people,  it  was  their  duty  as  patriots,  now 
that  they  had  control  of  the  executive  department  of  the 
government,  to  do  what  they  could  to  remove  the  last 
vestige  of  slavery  from  the  country ;  and,  conceding  to 
them  the  same  honesty  and  sincerity  which  they  claimed 
for  themselves,  the  people  of  the  Southern  States  had 
no  reason  to  doubt  that  such  would  be  their  course.  In 
view,  then,  of  these  declarations,  and  of  the  success 
in  the  presidential  election  of  the  party  that  indorsed 
them,  the  people  of  Missouri  may  be  excused  for  think- 
ing that  the  South  had  a  right  to  demand  additional 
guaranties  against  Northern  aggression.  Exactly  what 
these  guaranties  were  to  be  was  never  clearly  formu- 
lated. In  a  vague  sort  of  way  it  was  said  that  they 
must  be  embodied  in  a  constitutional  provision,  though 
how  that  provision  was  to  be  enforced,  or  made  any 
more  binding  than  were  the  mandates  of  the  Constitu- 
tion under  which  they  now  lived  and  of  the  violation  of 
which  they  complained,  is  a  point  upon  which  we  are 
left  to  conjecture. 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

THE    LEGISLATURE    AND    THE    CONSTITUTIONAL    CONVEN- 
TION :     MISSOURI    DECIDES    FOR    THE    UNION. 

Although  the  Breckenridge,  or  Southern  rights  men, 
were  in  a  minority  in  the  State  even  when  compared  with 
the  supporters  of  Douglas,  in  the  legislature  they  outnum- 
bered either  of  the  other  parties.  Not  being  numerous 
enough,  however,  to  effect  an  organization  by  themselves, 
they  united  with  the  Douglas  men,  and  by  this  means 
they  secured  the  election  of  their  candidate  for  speaker. 
The  newly  chosen  President  of  the  Senate,  too,  Lieuten- 
ant-Governor Thomas  C.  Reynolds,  belonged  to  their 
wing  of  the  party,  as  did  the  governor-elect,  Claiborne  F. 
Jackson,  so  that  the  Southern  rights  Democrats  were  in 
possession  of  the  chief  places  in  the  legislative  and  exec- 
utive departments  of  the  State  ;  and  but  for  the  fact  that 
they  voluntarily  relinquished  their  power  into  the  hands 
of  a  constitutional  convention,  it  was  possible  for  them  to 
have  given  the  course  of  legislation  a  very  different  di- 
rection from  that  which  it  was  eventually  made  to  take. 

The  retiring  governor,  Robert  M.  Stewart,  belonged 
to  a  different  school  of  politics.  He  was  a  Northern 
man  by  birth  and  no  friend  to  slavery,  though  he 
"  believed  that  the  Southern  people  had  the  I'ight  to 
take  their  slaves  into  all  the  territories  and  hold  them 
there,  under  the  protection  of  the  Constitution."  He 
was.  moreover,  a  staunch  Union  man ;  and  in  the  valedic- 


•26S  MiasouRi. 

toiy  message  which  he  sent  in  on  the  meeting  of  the 
General  Assembly,  he  denounced  the  heresy  of  secession, 
and  took  the  ground  that,  no  matter  what  the  other  slave 
States  might  do,  it  was  the  duty  of  Missouri,  as  it  was 
her  interest,  to  remain  within  the  Union.  But  whilst 
his  opinions  upon  this  point  were  very  decided,  he  was 
not  blind  to  the  scant  measure  of  justice  which  the 
South  had  received,  or  to  the  dangers  that  might  come 
to  her  institutions  from  hostile  legislation  ;  and  he  be- 
lieved that  the  only  way  to  maintain  the  Union  was  for 
the  North  to  give  the  South  guaranties  against  the 
threatened  aggressions, —  "  not  such  ephemeral  contracts 
as  are  enacted  by  Congress  to-day  and  repealed  to-mor- 
row, but  a  compromise  assuring  all  the  just  rights  of  the 
States,  and  agreed  to  in  solemn  convention  of  all  the 
parties  interested.  Upon  this  subject,"  he  continued, 
"  Missouri  has  the  right  to  speak,  because  she  has  suf- 
fered. Bounded  on  three  sides  by  free  territory,  her 
border  counties  have  been  the  frequent  scenes  of  kid- 
napping and  violence,  and  this  State  has  probably  lost  as 
nmch  in  the  last  two  years,  in  the  abduction  of  slaves,  as 
all  the  rest  of  the  Southern  States.  At  this  moment 
several  of  the  western  counties  are  desolated,  and  al- 
most depopulated,  from  fear  of  a  bandit  horde  who 
have  been  committing  depredation  —  ai'son,  theft,  and 
foul  murder  —  upon  her  adjacent  border.  Missouri 
has  a  right,  too,  by  reason  of  her  present  position  and 
power,  as  well  as  from  the  great  calamities  which  a  hasty 
dissolution  of  the  Union  would  bring  upon  her.  She 
has  already  a  larger  voting  population  than  any  of  the 
slave  States,  with  prospective  power  and  wealth  far  be- 
yond any  of  her  sister  States.  .  .  .  Indeed,  Missouri 
and  her  sister  border  States  should  be  the  first,  instead 


MISSOURI  DECIDES   EOIi   THE  UNI  OX.         209 

of  the  last,  to  speak  on  a  subject  of  this  kind.  They 
have  suffered  the  evil  and  the  wrong,  and  should  be  the 
first  to  demand  redress.  Is  it  quite  proper  that  those 
who  have  suffered  no  j^ecuniary  loss  should  initiate  a 
proceeding  of  this  kind,  and  say  to  us,  by  their  premature 
action,  that  we  do  not  know  when  to  redress  our  wrongs 
or  defend  our  honor  ?  Our  people  would  feel  more  sym- 
pathy with  the  movement  if  it  had  originated  amongst 
those  who,  like  ourselves,  had  suffered  severe  loss  and 
constant  annoyance  from  the  interference  and  depreda- 
tions of  outsiders. 

"  As  matters  are  at  present,  Missouri  will  .  .  .  hold 
to  the  Union  so  long  as  it  is  worth  an  effort  to  preserve 
it.  So  long  as  there  is  hope  of  success,  she  will  seek  for 
justice  within  the  Union.  She  cannot  be  frightened 
from  her  propriety  by  the  past  unfriendly  legislation  of 
the  North,  nor  be  dragooned  into  secession  by  the  ex- 
treme South.  If  those  who  should  be  our  friends  and 
allies  undertake  to  .  .  .  reduce  us  to  the  position  of  an 
humble  sentinel  to  watch  over  and  protect  their  inter- 
ests, receiving  all  of  the  blows  and  none  of  the  benefits, 
Missouri  will  hesitate  long  before  sanctioning  such  an 
arrangement.  She  will  rather  take  the  high  position  of 
armed  neutrality.  .  .  . 

"  If  South  Carolina  and  other  cotton  States  persist 
in  secession,  she  will  desire  to  see  them  go  in  peace,  with 
the  hope  that  a  short  experience  at  separate  govern- 
ment, and  an  honorable  adjustment  of  the  federal  com- 
pact, will  induce  them  to  return  to  their  former  position. 
In  the  mean  time  Missouri  will  hold  herself  in  readiness 
at  any  moment  to  defend  her  soil  from  pollution  and 
her  property  from  plunder  by  fanatics  and  ma)'auders, 
come  from  what  quarter  they  may." 


270  MISSOURI. 

In  this  vein  he  continued  for  some  time  longer,  and 
then,  after  painting  in  glowing  colors  the  benefits  that 
had  flowed  from  the  establishment  of  the  Union,  and 
the  evils  that  must  necessarily  follow  its  dissolution,  he 
concluded  with  an  impassioned  appeal  for  its  preserva- 
tion, in  the  course  of  which  he  said  that,  "  whilst  rec- 
ommending the  adoption  of  all  pi'oper  measures  and  in- 
fluences to  secure  the  just  acknowledgment  and  protec- 
tion of  our  rights,  and,  in  final  failure  of  this,  a  resort 
to  the  last  painful  remedy  of  separation  ;  yet,  regard- 
ing .  .  .  the  American  confederacy  as  the  source  of  a 
thousand  blessings,  pecuniary,  social,  and  moral,  and  its 
destruction  as  fraught  with  incalculable  loss,  suffering, 
and  crime,  I  would  here.  In  my  last  public  official  act 
as  governor  of  Missouri,  record  my  solemn  protest 
against  unwise  and  hasty  action,  and  my  unalterable 
devotion  to  the  Union,  so  long  as  it  can  be  made  the 
protector  of  equal  rights." 

This  message  was  received  on  the  3d  of  January,  and 
on  the  same  day  Governor  Jackson  was  sworn  into  office 
and  delivered  his  Inaugural  address. 

Born  In  Kentucky  of  Virginia  parentage,  Jackson  had 
come  to  Missouri  in  his  boyhood,  and  found  employment 
in  a  country  store.  By  the  time  he  was  thirty  years  of 
age  he  had  accumulated  enough  of  this  world's  goods  to 
enable  him  to  retire  from  business  and  devote  himself  to 
politics,  "  for  which  he  had  a  natural  aptitude  and  great 
fondness."  In  1836,  he  was  first  elected  to  the  legisla- 
ture, and  from  that  time  until  his  death  in  1862  he  was 
steadily  in  public  life.  In  1849  he  was  a  member  of 
the  state  senate,  and,  as  chairman  of  the  committee  on 
federal  relations,  he  reported  the  resolutions  of  instruc- 
tions which  bear  his  name,  and  which,  as  we  have  seen, 


MISSOURI  DECIDES   FOR   THE    UNION.         271 

led  to  Benton's  appeal  from  the  deeision  of  the  legisla- 
ture to  the  people  of  the  State.  In  the  fierce  struggle 
that  ensued,  Jackson  was  a  conspicuous  figure,  and  it 
was  the  readiness  he  showed  in  debate,  and  the  skill  he 
displayed  in  the  management  of  men,  that  gave  him  the 
leading  position  which  he  then  took  in  the  councils  of 
his  party,  and  which  he  ever  afterwards  maintained. 

He  was  at  this  time  fifty-five  years  of  age,  and  is  de- 
scribed by  one  who  knew  him  well  as  being  "  tall,  erect, 
and  dignified  ;  a  vigorous  thinker,  and  a  fluent  and  for- 
cible sjieaker,  always  interesting,  and  often  eloquent ;  a 
well-informed  man,  thoroughly  conversant  with  the  poli- 
tics of  Missouri  and  of  the  Union  ;  with  positive  opinions 
on  all  public  questions,  and  the  courage  to  express  and 
uphold  them  ;  courteous  in  his  bearing  towards  all  men, 
for  he  was  kind-hearted,  and  by  nature  a  democrat ; 
and  a  truthful,  honest,  and  honorable  gentleman.  He 
loved  the  Union,  but  not  with  the  love  with  which  he 
loved  Missouri,  which  had  been  his  home  for  forty  years, 
nor  as  he  loved  the  South,  where  he  was  born  and  where 
his  kindred  lived."  ^ 

Called  to  the  high  position  which  he  now  occupied  at 
a  moment  of  unparalleled  excitement,  he  is  said  to  have 
"  assumed  the  office  with  becoming  modesty,  but  with  an 
unshakable  determination  to  defend  the  honor  and  the 
interests  of  Missouri  against  all  assailants  whatsoever." 

In  the  course  of  his  address,  after  commenting  on  the 
rise  of  the  Republican  party,  he  went  on  to  say  that  it 

^  For  these  facts,  and  many  others  in  the  course  of  this  and  the 
succeeding  chapter,  I  am  indebted  to  Colonel  Thomas  L.  Snead, 
whose  Fight  for  Missouri  must  be  carefully  studied  by  any  one  who 
wishes  to  arrive  at  a  correct  understanding'  of  the  course  of  events 
in  Missouri  at  this  critical  period. 


272  MISSOURI. 

was  purely  sectional,  and  that  its  one  principle  was  hos- 
tility to  slavery.  Its  object  was,  "  not  merely  to  confine 
slavery  within  its  present  limits  ;  not  merely  to  exclude 
it  from  the  territories,  and  prevent  the  formation  and 
admission  of  any  slaveholding  States,  .  .  .  but  to  strike 
down  its  existence  everywhere.  .  .  .  The  triumph  of 
such  an  organization  is  not  the  victory  of  a  political 
party,  but  the  domination  of  a  section.  It  proclaims  in 
significant  tones  the  destruction  of  that  equality  among 
the  States  which  is  the  vital  cement  of  our  federal 
Union." 

The  destiny  of  the  slaveholding  States  was  one  and 
the  same,  and  Missouri,  he  thought,  would  "  best  con- 
sult her  own  interests,  and  the  interests  of  the  whole 
country,  by  a  timely  declaration  of  her  determination  to 
stand  by  her  sister  slaveholding  States,  in  whose  wrongs 
she  participates,  and  with  whose  institutions  and  peo- 
ple she  sympathizes.  These  views,"  he  said,  '•  are  ad- 
vanced, not  upon  a  belief  that  all  hope  of  the  present 
Union  is  lost,  but  upon  a  conviction  that  the  time  has 
arrived  when  a  further  postponement  of  their  considera- 
tion would  be  unwise  and  unsafe.  ...  So  far  as  Mis- 
souri is  concerned,  her  citizens  have  ever  been  devoted 
to  the  Union,  and  she  will  remain  in  it  so  long  as  there 
is  any  hope  that  it  Avill  maintain  the  spirit  and  guaran- 
ties of  the  Constitution. 

"  But  if  the  Northern  States  have  determined  to  put 
the  slaveholding  States  on  a  footing  of  inequality  by 
interdicting  them  from  all  share  in  the  territories  ac- 
quired by  the  common  blood  and  treasure  of  all ;  if  they 
have  resolved  to  admit  no  more  slaveholding  States  into 
the  Union  ;  and  if  they  mean  to  persist  in  nullifying 
that  provision  of  the  Constitution  which  secures  to  the 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR    THE    UNION.        273 

slaveholder  his  property  when  found  within  the  limits 
of  States  which  do  not  recognize  it  or  have  abolished 
it,  —  then  they  have  themselves  practically  abandoned 
the  Union.  .  .  . 

"  We  hear  it  suggested  in  some  quarters,"  he  con- 
tinued, "  that  the  Union  is  to  be  maintained  by  the 
sword,"  but  this,  he  urged,  would  lead  to  consolidation 
or  despotism,  not  to  union.  "  That  stands  upon  the 
basis  of  justice  and  equality,  and  its  existence  cannot  be 
prolonged  by  coercion. 

"  As  the  ultimate  fate  of  all  the  slaveholding  States 
is  necessarily  the  same,  their  determination  and  action 
.  .  .  should  be  the  result  of  a  general  consultation," 
and  should  be  in  the  nature  of  a  demand  for  a  constitu- 
tional guaranty  and  not  a  congressional  compromise, 
"  as  experience  had  shown  that  such  compromises  only 
lay  the  foundation  for  additional  agitation.  Being  but 
laws,  they  are,  like  all  other  laws,  liable  to  be  repealed  ; 
and  their  duration  depends  altogether  upon  the  fluctua- 
tions of  public  opinion,  operating  through,  the  representa- 
tives of  that  opinion  at  Washington."  In  conclusion  he 
said  that  he  was  "  not  without  hope  that  an  adjustment 
alike  honorable  to  both  sections  may  be  effected,  .  .  . 
but  in  the  present  unfavorable  aspect  of  affairs  it  is  our 
duty  to  prepare  for  the  worst.  We  cannot  avoid  dan- 
ger by  closing  our  eyes  to  it.  The  magnitude  of  the 
interests  now  in  jeopardy  demands  a  pi'ompt  but  deliber- 
ate consideration  ;  and  in  order  that  the  will  of  the  peo- 
ple may  be  ascertained  and  effectuated,  a  State  conven- 
tion should  ...  be  called."  He  also  advised,  "  in  view  of 
the  marauding  forays  which  continue  to  harass  our  bor- 
ders, as  well  as  of  the  general  unsettled  condition  of  our 
political  relations,"  that  the  militia  of  the  State  should 
be  thoroughly  organized. 


274  MISSOURI. 

Upon  a  comparison  of  these  two  messages  it  will  be 
found  that  up  to  a  certain  point  they  are  in  full  accord, 
and  there  can  be  no  question  that  to  that  extent  they 
reflected  the  sentiments  of  an  overwhelming  majority  of 
the  people  of  the  State.  It  was  only  in  the  event  of  the 
attempt  on  the  part  of  the  North  to  coerce  the  seceding 
States  back  into  the  Union,  that  the  paths  recommended 
by  Stewart  and  Jackson  began  to  diverge.  In  such  a 
contingency  the  former  thought  the  true  policy  of  Mis- 
souri was  to  adhere  to  the  Union,  whilst  the  latter  held 
that  the  honor  as  well  as  the  interest  of  the  State  re- 
quired her  to  make  common  cause  with  the  South.  As 
yet,  this  issue  was  in  abeyance,  and  there  were,  compar- 
atively sjDeaking,  but  few  who  imagined  that  she  would 
ever  be  called  upon  to  make  the  decision.  Among  these 
few,  though,  was  Francis  Preston  Blair,  Jr.,  the  leader 
of  the  unconditional  Union  men  of  the  State.  With 
rare  foresight,  he  had  already  grasped  the  situation, 
and  even  now  he  was  busy  organizing  the  force  which, 
when  the  moment  of  action  came,  enabled  him  to  lay 
an  iron  hand  upon  the  city  of  St.  Louis,  and  by  a  move- 
ment necessary,  perhaps,  but  none  the  less  revolution- 
aiy,  drive  the  regularly  constituted  authorities  of  the 
State  away  from  the  capital  and  into  exile. 

Blair  was  then  forty  years  of  age,  having  been  born 
in  Lexington,  Kentucky,  in  February,  1821,  of  Vir- 
ginia parentage.  When  but  a  lad,  his  father,  upon  the 
invitation  of  General  Jackson,  removed  to  Washing- 
ton city,  and  took  the  editorial  control  of  the  adminis- 
tration organ  ;  and  it  was  in  this  school  and  under  such 
teachers  that  "  Frank  Blair,"  as  he  was  familiarly  called, 
learned  his  first  lessons  in  politics.  In  due  time  he  was 
sent  to  Princeton  College,  and  soon  after  he  came  to 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR   THE    UNION.        Tib 

St.  Louis,  where,  in  1843,  we  find  liim  studying  law  in 
the  office  of  his  brother,  Judge  Montgomery  Blair,  af- 
terwards postmaster-general  under  President  Lincoln. 
In  1845,  on  the  outbreak  of  the  Mexican  war,  he  was 
in  Santa  Fe,  whither  he  had  gone  for  his  health ;  and 
when  Kearney  took  possession  of  that  territory  and  an- 
nexed it  to  the  United  States,  he  ajipointed  him  attor- 
ney general  in  the  provisional  government  which  was 
then  established,  and  of  which  Charles  Bent  was  the 
head.  Returning  to  St.  Louis  in  1847,  young  Blair 
made  his  first  appearance  in  the  political  field  in  the 
presidential  election  of  1848,  when  he  championed  the 
cause  of  Van  Buren,  the  unsuccessful  candidate  of  the 
free-soilers.  In  the  following  year,  he  supported  Col- 
onel Benton  on  the  occasion  of  his  appeal  from  the  leg- 
islature to  the  people  of  the  State ;  and  when  death 
removed  that  doughty  warrior  from  the  field  of  Mis- 
souri politics,  Blair,  by  common  consent,  took  his  place, 
and  became  the  leader  of  the  anti-slavery  men  of  the 
State.  In  1852  and  again  in  1854  he  was  elected  to  the 
legislature  upon  the  Benton  ticket ;  and  in  1856  he  was 
transferred  to  the  national  House  of  Representatives  at 
Washington,  of  which  body  he  Avas  a  member  -  elect, 
having  been  returned,  for  the  second  time,  at  the  pre- 
ceding election. 

During  all  this  portion  of  his  career,  and  in  fact  until 
slavery  was  stricken  down  by  the  strong  hand  of  arbi- 
trary power,  Blair  was  its  steady  and  consistent  oppo- 
nent, though  he  was  by  no  means  an  abolitionist  in  the 
sense  in  which  that  term  was  then  used.  He  did,  it  is 
true,  wish  to  get  rid  of  the  negroes  in  Missouri,  and  his 
efforts  were  no  doubt  directed  to  this  end.  He  was 
also  in  favor  of  keeping  them  out  of  aU  territory  not 


276  MISSOURI. 

yet  cursed  by  the  presence  of  slavery  ;  but  In  taking 
this  course  he  was  governed  by  economic  considerations, 
and  "  not  by  a  sentimental  regard  for  the  blacks,  or  a  de- 
lusion as  to  their  equality  with  the  whites."  In  a  word, 
he  approached  the  subject  as  a  statesman,  rather  than  as  a 
moralist,  and  he  wished  to  abolish  the  system  in  Missouri 
because  he  saw  that  it  was  a  burden  upon  the  State,  and 
must  inevitably  retard  her  development  in  wealth  and 
population. 

For  advocating  these  views,  he  was  often,  called  an 
abolitionist,  which  troubled  him  but  little  ;  and  it  is  pos- 
sible, though  Colonel  Benton  did  not  find  it  so,  that 
there  may  have  been  portions  of  the  State  in  which  it 
would  not  have  been  safe  for  him  to  speak  his  senti- 
ments on  this  subject ;  but  this  was  evidently  not  the 
case  in  St.  Louis,  where  his  friends  were  in  the  major- 
ity, where  his  personal  popularity,  even  among  those 
who  differed  from  him  politically,  was  very  great,  and 
where  his  high  social  position  was  unquestioned.  In- 
deed, it  may  well  be  doubted  whether  Blair  himself 
thought  so,  for  in  those  days,  as  some  of  us  can  remem- 
ber, there  was  no  surer  way  of  leading  him  to  make  a 
fierce  attack  upon  slavery,  no  matter  how  unpalatable 
his  speech  may  have  been  to  some  of  his  hearers,  than  by 
assuring  him  that  its  delivery  would  be  attended  with 
personal  danger.  In  the  pursuit  of  an  object  which  he 
had  once  marked  out  for  himself  as  desirable  and  proper, 
he  knew  no  such  thing  as  fear,  and  it  is  but  just  to  add 
that  in  moral  courage  he  was  equally  grand. 

Such  was  the  man  to  whom  the  Union  men  of  Mis- 
souri now  turned,  and  not  in  vain,  for  counsel  and  en- 
couragement. As  has  already  been  intimated,  he  was 
one  of  the  few  who  realized  the  full  significance  of  the 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR   THE    UNION.        Til 

impending  struggle,  and  he  never  deluded  himself  with 
the  hope  that  it  might  be  peaceably  settled.  From  the 
first,  he  seems  to  have  felt  instinctively  that  it  was 
one  of  those  questions  that  could  only  be  decided  by  an 
ap})eal  to  the  sword,  and,  acting  on  the  maxim  that 
"  God  fights  on  the  side  of  the  heavest  battalions,"  he 
began  at  once  to  make  ready  for  the  part  which  he  in- 
tended to  play  in  the  bloody  drama. 

These  preparations,  it  is  proper  to  say,  were  not  car- 
ried on  with  any  very  great  amount  of  secrecy,  and  in 
fact  there  was  no  particular  reason  why  they  should 
have  been,  though  the  contrary  has  been  asserted.  The 
semi-military  associations,  composed  chiefly  of  Germans, 
which,  under  the  name  of  Wide-A wakes,  had  done  good 
service  for  Lincoln  in  the  election  of  1860,  had  a  per- 
fect right  to  continue  their  organization  as  Union  clubs, 
home  guards,  or  under  any  other  name  that  they  might 
think  proper  to  adopt,  and  that  they  were  doing  so,  was 
well  understood.  The  use,  too,  to  which  they  were  to 
be  put  in  case  an  effort  was  made  to  detach  Missouri 
from  the  Union,  was  never  doubted  by  any  one  who 
knew  Blair ;  and  yet^  despite  this  fact,  so  reluctant  were 
Governor  Jackson  and  the  Southern  sympathizers  in  the 
legislature  to  take  any  steps  that  would  bring  the  State 
into  conflict  with  the  federal  government,  without  the  pre- 
viously expressed  approval  of  the  people,  that,  although 
they  were  fully  alive  to  the  necessities  of  the  situation, 
they  failed  to  take  advantage  of  the  only  opportunity 
they  ever  had  of  securing  such  a  supply  of  arms  as 
would  have  enabled  them  to  meet  Blair,  upon  anything 
like  equal  terms,  in  the  fight  which  he  was  evidently 
determined  to  make  for  Missouri.  Had  they  shown  as 
little  hesitation  in  making  war  upon  the  federal  govern- 


278  M  IB  so  URL 

ment  as,  some  four  months  later,  the  federal  government 
showed  in  making  war  upon  Missouri,  they  would  have 
seized  the  arsenal,  as  there  is  reason  to  believe  they 
might  have  done  at  almost  any  time  during  the  first 
three  weeks  of  January,  1861,  and  as  it  was  clearly 
their  policy  to  do,  with  or  without  law,  in  case  they  had 
resolved  upon  secession,  and  had  the  power  to  carry 
their  resolution  into  effect.  Instead  of  doing  so,  they 
contented  themselves  with  adopting  a  measure,  which 
not  only  committed  them  to  a  course  of  delay  when  in- 
stant action  was  necessary  to  the  success  of  their  cause, 
but  which  involved,  on  their  part,  a  relinquishment  of 
the  power  of  legislation  upon  the  very  question  that 
was  at  issue.  By  the  terms  of  this  act,  which  was 
approved  on  the  21st  of  January,  it  was  provided  that 
an  election  should  be  held  on  the  18th  of  February 
for  members  of  a  convention  who  were  "  to  consider 
the  relations  between  the  government  of  the  United 
States  .  .  .  and  the  government  and  people  of  the  State 
of  Missouri ;  and  to  adopt  such  measures  for  vindicat- 
ing the  sovereignty  of  the  State,  and  the  protection  of 
its  institutions,  as  shall  appear  to  them  to  be  demanded." 
By  way  of  safeguard,  it  was  added  that  "  no  act,  ordi- 
nance, or  resolution  of  said  convention  shall  be  deemed 
to  be  valid  to  change  or  dissolve  the  political  relations 
of  this  State  to  the  government  of  the  United  States, 
or  any  other  State,  until  a  majority  of  the  qualified  vot- 
ers of  this  State,  voting  upon  the  question,  shall  ratify 
the  same." 

So  far  as  the  action  of  Blair  and  the  Wide-A wakes 
was  concerned,  the  adojDtion  of  this  measure  Avas  with- 
out any  practical  effect.  He  had  made  up  his  mind 
that,  in  a  certain  contingency,  he  would  wage  war  upon 


MISSOURI  DECIDES   FOR   THE    UNION.      279 

his  State,  and,  as  in  that  event  it  ■would  make  but  Httle 
difference  what  laws  or  how  many  of  them  stood  in  the 
way,  he  did  not  consider  it  necessary  to  pretermit  his 
exertions  to  arm  and  equip  the  recruits  that  were  flock- 
ing to  his  standard. 

Not  so,  in  regard  to  the  Southern  sympathizers,  or 
secessionists,  as,  for  the  sake  of  brevity,  we  shall  now 
call  them.  To  them,  and  the  cause  they  had  so  much 
at  heart,  this  measure  was  full  of  serious  consequences. 
As  has  been  said,  it  amounted  practically  to  an  abdica- 
tion by  the  legislature  of  certain  powers,  and,  although 
in  all  probability  not  so  intended,  yet,  in  so  far  as  it 
gave  occasion  to  the  exhibition  of  Union  sentiment 
which  took  place  at  the  February  election,  it  was 
fraught  with  disaster  to  the  cause  of  the  South.  No 
matter  from  what  point  of  view  we  approach  it,  the 
effect  will  be  found  to  have  been  the  same.  Regarded 
as  a  political  measure,  it  checked  at  once  the  drift  of 
Missouri  secessionward,  and  later  on,  by  a  vote  that  ad- 
mitted of  no  dispute,  it  fixed  her  position  firmly  in  and 
with  the  Union.  By  the  same  token,  it  placed  her  vast 
resources  in  men  and  quartermasters'  stores  at  the  ser- 
vice of  the  Union,  and,  speaking  militarily,  it  may  be 
roughly  said  to  have  thrown  back  the  Confederate  line 
of  battle  from  the  Missouri  to  the  Arkansas. 

Curiously  enough,  although  this  measure  brought  with 
it  an  Iliad  of  woes  to  the  cause  of  the  South,  yet  so 
little  were  its  consequences  foreseen,  that  at  the  time  of 
its  adoption  it  was  regarded  by  the  Southern  sympa- 
thizers as  a  triumph.  In  a  certain  sense  this  was  per- 
haps true,  for  it  enabled  them  to  appeal  to  the  people 
of  the  State  upon  an  issue  upon  which  they  could  not 
carry  the  legislature,  but  from  any  other  point  of  view 


280  MISSOURI. 

it  was  a  mistake.  The  times  were  revolutionary,  and 
whilst  the  Southern  rights  men  in  the  legislature  may 
have  had  every  confidence  in  the  result  of  the  appeal 
to  the  people,  they  do  not  appear  to  have  realized  the 
fact  that  every  moment  of  delay  strengthened  Blair 
and  weakened  them.  Indeed,  when  Ave  reflect  that  the 
very  measure,  which  they  welcomed  as  a  harbinger  of 
success,  not  only  tied  the  hands  of  their  friends  at  a 
time  when  instant  action  could  alone  have  saved  their 
cause,  but  that  it  also  resulted  in  the  total  annihilation 
of  their  party  at  the  succeeding  election,  it  would  seem 
as  if  the  irony  of  fate  could  scarcely  have  reached 
further. 

To  understand  the  influences  that  combined  to 
bring  about  the  adoption  of  this  measure,  it  is  necessary 
to  bear  in  mind  that  the  three  leading  parties  in  the 
legislature,  consisting  respectively  of  the  followers  of 
Breckinridge,  Douglas,  and  Bell,  were  so  evenly  divided 
that  they  served  as  checks  upon  one  another.  The 
Southern  sympathizers,  whose  main  support  was  drawn 
from  the  Breckinridge  men,  were  not  strong  enough  to 
carry  a  resolution  in  favor  of  secession,  even  if  they 
had  been  disposed  to  do  so ;  and  the  Union  men, 
though  united  upon  one  point,  differed  among  them- 
selves to  such  an  extent  upon  certain  ulterior  issues 
that  it  was  difficult  for  them  to  find  any  ground  which 
they  could  occupy  in  common.  Moreover,  at  the  time 
of  the  election,  the  question  of  secession  had  not  en- 
tered into  the  canvass,  and  consequently  there  was  no 
certainty  as  to  what  was  the  prevailing  sentiment  of  the 
people  of  the  State  in  regard  to  it.  For  these  reasons, 
among  others,  the  members  of  the  legislature,  unwill- 
ing to  assume  the  responsibility  of  committing  the  State 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR   THE    UNION.        281 

to  a  line  of  action  that  might  prove  unacceptable,  and 
hopeful,  perhaps,  of  the  success  of  their  respective  views, 
joined,  almost  without  distinction  of  party,  in  refer- 
ring the  question  back  to  the  people.  In  the  Senate 
there  were  but  two  votes  against  the  measure,  and  in 
the  House  but  eighteen,  eleven  of  whom  were  Republi- 
cans from  St.  Louis.  In  fact,  it  may  be  said  that  the 
Republicans  alone  opposed  it ;  and  yet,  by  an  unex- 
pected turn  of  the  wheel,  their  wing  of  the  Union  party 
was  the  only  one  that  derived  a  permanent  benefit  from 
it.  Probably  no  more  striking  instance  can  be  given  of 
the  changes  that  were  now  going  on  in  the  opinions  of 
the  people  of  the  border  States,  or  of  the  certainty 
with  which  the  Union  men  were  gradually  coming  up  to 
the  position  to  wliich  they  were  logically  committed. 

With  the  adoption  of  this  measure  all  political  legis- 
lation came,  for  the  time  being,  to  an  end.  Resolu- 
tions, it  is  true,  were  adopted  which  denounced  coercion 
in  vigorous  terms,  and  pledged  Missouri  to  resist  it  by 
force  ;  but  except  in  so  far  as  they  may  be  taken  as  in- 
dicating the  opinions  of  the  individual  members  of  the 
legislature,  they  amounted  to  nothing.  The  power  to 
decide  upon  the  course  which  Missouri  was  to  follow 
was  now  in  the  hands  of  the  convention,  placed  thei'e 
by  the  act  of  the  legislature  itself,  and  so  long  as  this 
act  was  unrepealed,  any  attempt  on  the  part  of  the  leg- 
islature to  shape  that  course  was  a  mere  waste  of  time. 

In  the  canvass  which  now  took  place  for  the  choice 
of  delegates  to  the  convention,  the  best  men  in  the  State 
came  to  the  front.  The  rights  of  the  States  and  the 
authority  of  the  federal  government  to  coerce  a  State  ; 
the  relations  of  Missouri  to  the  Union,  to  the  seceded 
States,  and  her  duty  in  the  premises  to   them   and  to 


282  MISSOVRT. 

herself,  —  in  a  word,  the  whole  question  of  secession,  so 
far  as  it  bore  upon  the  future  of  the  State,  was  thor- 
oughly discussed,  and  with  an  earnestness  and  an  ab- 
sence of  excitement  that  showed  how  deeply  impressed 
the  great  mass  of  the  people  were  with  the  gravity  of 
the  situation. 

Among  those  who  were  most  prominent  on  the  side 
of.  the  South,  we  may  mention  the  governor  of  the 
State,  Senators  James  S.  Green  and  Trusten  Polk,  ex- 
Senator  and  ex- Vice-President  David  R.  Atchison,  with 
Vest,  Parsons,  Claiborne,  Churchill,  and  others  in  the 
General  Assembly.  Their  organ  was  the  "  St.  Louis 
Bulletin,"  of  which  J.  W.  Tucker  and  Thomas  L. 
Snead  were  the  editors.  From  the  latter,  whose  position 
as  a  chosen  counselor  of  Governor  Jackson,  and  sub- 
sequently as  a  trusted  officer  on  General  Price's  staff, 
enabled  him  to  speak  with  authority  as  to  the  motives 
of  his  party  friends,  we  learn  that  there  were  but  few 
of  them  who  were  primarily  secessionists  or  believed 
in  the  I'ight  of  secession.  They  deplored  the  precipi- 
tate action  of  South  Carolina  and  the  other  seceding 
States,  and  would  gladly  have  persuaded  them  to  re- 
turn to  the  Union  and  trust  to  peaceful  methods  for  the 
protection  of  their  rights.  They  were  not  particularly 
devoted  to  the  institution  of  slavery,  nor  were  they 
deeply  interested  in  the  maintenance  of  that  system. 
They  were  secessionists  onlij  because  they  believed  that 
the  Union  had  been  dissolved,  that  its  reconstruc- 
tion was  impossible,  that  war  was  inevitable,  and  that 
in  war  the  place  of  Missouri  was  by  the  side  of  the 
Southern  States.  Opposed  to  them  were  the  Union 
men,  who  were  divided  among  themselves,  according  to 
the  degree  of  their  loyalty,  into  conditional  and  uncon- 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR   THE    UNION.        283 

ditional  Union  men.  but  who  upon  this  occasion,  thanks 
to  the  adroit  management  of  Blair,  voted  together.  Of 
these  two  subdivisions,  the  former  was  composed  ahnost 
ahogether  of  those  who  had  supported  Douglas  and 
Bell  at  the  presidential  election,  and,  as  events  subse- 
quently proved,  they  constituted  a  large  majority  of 
the  people  of  the  State.  They  did  not  believe  in  seces- 
sion as  a  remedy  for  the  evils  of  which  the  South 
complained,  and  in  their  speeches  and  ^vi'itings  they 
avowed  their  attachment  to  the  Union,  and  declared 
their  intention  of  standing  by  it  so  long  as  there  was  a 
hope  of  preserving  it.  Some  plan  of  adjustment,  they 
felt  certain,  would  be  adopted,  and  they  referred  to 
the  Crittenden  proposition,  which  had  been  declared 
satisfactory  by  those  representative  Southern  senators, 
Toombs  of  Georgia,  and  Davis  of  Mississippi,  as  af- 
fording a  basis  of  settlement  upon  which  all  could  agree. 
If,  however,  the  North  should  refuse  to  listen  to  the 
just  demand  of  the  South  for  additional  guaranties 
against  aggressive  legislation,  it  would  then,  they 
thought  and  said,  be  the  duty  of  Missouri  to  unite  with 
the  Southern  States  for  the  protection  of  their  common 
interests,  including,  of  course,  slavery.  They  also  de- 
clared that  "  if  the  North,  pending  the  attempt  to  adjust 
matters  peaceably,  should  make  war  upon  any  Southern 
State.  Missouri  would  take  up  arms  in  its  defense." 

The  position  of  the  unconditional  Union  men  differed 
from  this  in  one  very  important  particular.  As  their 
name  indicated,  they  took  the  ground  that  they  would 
support  the  government  in  any  and  every  measure  that 
might  be  deemed  necessary  to  preserve  the  Union  and 
enforce  the  laws.  They  were  recruited  from  the  ranks 
of  the  Republicans,  or  supporters  of  Lincoln,  and,  natu- 


284  MISSOURI. 

rally  enough,  they  were  elated  at  their  success  at  the 
late  election,  and  provoked  at  what  seemed  to  them  to 
be  the  refusal  of  the  secessionists  to  abide  by  the  result 
of  that  election.  In  St.  Louis,  where,  alone  in  the 
State,  they  could  expect  to  form  an  appreciable  factor 
in  the  political  problem,  a  large  majority  of  them  were 
Germans,  though  their  leaders  were  Anglo-Americans, 
and,  with  but  few  exceptions,  men  of  Southern  birth 
and  lineage.  Between  them  and  the  conditional  Union 
men  there  was  but  little  sympathy  ;  in  fact,  not  much 
could  have  been  expected  when  one  party  held  the  other 
responsible  for  the  deplorable  condition  in  which  affairs 
then  were,  and  the  other  recriminated  by  charging  their 
quasi  friends  and  allies  with  being  but  little  better  than 
secessionists  in  disguise.  So  bitter  was  the  feeling  that 
it  required  all  of  Blair's  tact  and  management  to  induce 
the  two  wings  of  the  party  to  work  together  against  the 
common  enemy.  "  I  don't  believe,"  said  a  Republican 
partisan,  "  in  breaking  up  the  Republican  party  just  to 
please  these  tender-footed  Unionists.  I  believe  in  stick- 
ing to  the  party."  "  Let  us  have  a  country  first," 
responded  Blair,  "  and  then  we  can  talk  about  parties." 
This  was  sound  advice,  and  backed  as  it  was  by  the 
full  weight  of  Blair's  personal  influence,  it  resulted,  in 
St.  Louis,  in  the  formation  of  a  ticket  composed  o£ 
seven  Douglas,  three  Bell,  and  four  Lincoln  men,  which 
swept  the  county  by  a  majority  of  over  five  thousand. 
In  the  State  at  large  the  victory  of  the  Union  men  was 
not  less  complete.  By  a  majority  of  eighty  thousand 
the  people  of  Missouri  decided  against  secession.  Not 
a  single  member  of  that  party  was  returned  to  the  con- 
vention ;  though  there  were  a  number  of  the  delegates 
who  were  believers  in  the  doctrine  of  states  -  rights,  or 


MISSOURI  DECIDES   FOR   THE    UNION.        285 

as  it  is  now  termed,  local  self-government.  Of  the  whole 
number  of  members  eighty-one  were  born  in  the  slave 
States,  fourteen  in  the  North,  three  in  Europe,  and  one 
in  the  District  of  Columbia. 

To  speak  of  the  result  of  the  election  as  being  a  sur- 
prise and  a  disappointment  to  the  secessionist  leaders  is 
but  faintly  to  describe  the  feelings  with  which  they  wit- 
nessed the  overthrow  of  their  air-built  castles.  They 
liad  worked  themselves  into  the  belief  that  Missouri  was 
ready  to  foUow  South  Carolina  and  the  rest  of  the  cotton 
States  into  the  secessionist  camp,  and  was  only  waiting 
for  the  forthcoming  election  in  order  to  do  so ;  and  so 
satisfied  were  they  of  it  that  they  did  not  hesitate  to 
counsel  delay  to  a  small  and  gallant  band  of  their 
friends,  who  were  anxious  to  attempt  the  seizure  of  the 
arsenal.  "  Wait,"  said  they  in  effect,  "  until  the  jieople 
shall,  at  the  forthcoming  election,  declare  their  intention 
of  siding  with  the  South  !  Then  the  governor  will  order 
General  Frost  to  seize  the  arsenal  in  the  name  of  the 
State,  and  he  with  his  brigade  and  the  minute  men  and 
the  thousands  "  who  it  was  supposed  would  flock  to  his 
aid,  could  easily  do  it. 

From  these  dreams,  as  they  are  now  known  to  have 
been,  the  secessionist  members  of  the  General  Assem- 
bly were  rudely  awakened  by  the  result  of  the  election. 
It  was  a  verdict  that  admitted  of  no  misinterpretation, 
and  as  such  it  was  accepted.  The  military  biU,  as  it 
was  called,  which  was  intended  to  arm  and  equip  the 
militia,  and  was  supposed,  in  some  quarters,  to  cloak  a 
project  for  forcing  the  State  into  secession,  was  accord- 
ingly shelved,  and  Missouri  prejjared  of  her  own  free 
will,  and  by  the  votes  of  her  chosen  delegates,  eighty  per 
cent,  of  whom  were  southern  born,  to  take  her  place  with 
the  loyal  North. 


286  MISSOURI. 

On  the  28th  of  February,  agreeably  to  the  law  which 
called  it  into  existence,  the  convention  met  at  Jefferson 
City.  Sterlincr  Price,  a  decided  Union  man,  who  had 
been  member  of  Congress,  governor  of  the  State,  and 
had  played  a  conspicuous  part  in  the  conquest  and  oc- 
cupation of  New  Mexico,  was  chosen  president,  the  vote 
being  seventy-five  for  Price,  to  fifteen  for  Nathaniel  W. 
Watkins,  a  half-brother  of  Henry  Clay.  As  soon  as 
the  organization  was  complete,  an  adjournment  was  had 
to  St.  Louis,  whose  loyal  atmosphere  is  said  to  have 
been  preferable  to  that  of  the  capital,  though  it  is  prob- 
able that  the  comfort  and  convenience  of  the  members, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  desirability  of  having  a  suitable 
hall  for  their  deliberations,  may  have  had  something  to 
do  with  the  change.  On  the  4th  of  March,  the  day  of 
Lincoln's  inauguration,  the  convention  reassembled  in 
St.  Louis,  and  by  an  ominous  conjunction  it  was  on  the 
afternoon  of  this  day  that,  by  special  invitation,  Luther 
J.  Glenn,  commissioner  fi'om  the  State  of  Georgia,  ap- 
peared before  the  convention  for  the  purpose  of  making 
the  communication  with  which  he  was  charged.  In  a 
few  well-chosen  sentences  he  announced  the  secession  of 
Georgia  from  the  Union,  with  the  reasons  therefor,  and 
in  the  name  of  his  State  he  asked  the  people  of  Missouri 
to  adopt  a  similar  course,  and  unite  with  their  kinsmen 
in  Georgia  in  forming  a  Southern  confederacy.  His 
message  was  not  favorably  received,  though  the  able 
adverse  report  of  John  B.  Henderson  was  not  acted 
upon,  the  necessity  for  such  a  proceeding  having  been 
superseded  by  the  adoption  of  the  report  of  the  com- 
mittee on  federal  relations  which  virtually  covered  the 
same  ground. 

This   most   important  committee,    appointed  for  the 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR   THE    UNION.        287 

purpose  of  considering  "the  relations  now  existing  be- 
tween the  government  of  the  United  States,  the  govern- 
ment and  people  of  the  different  States,  and  the  govern- 
ment and  people  of  this  State,"  consisted  of  Hamilton 
R.  Gamble,  chairman,  John  B.  Henderson,  John  T. 
Redd,  William  A.  Hall.  Jacob  T.  TIndall,  Alexander 
W.  Doniphan,  Nathaniel  W.  Watklns,  WiUard  P.  HaU, 
Harrison  Hough,  Samuel  L.  Sawyer,  William  Doug- 
lass, John  R.  Chenault,  and  William  J.  Ponieroy.  It 
was  a  picked  body,  fairly  representative  of  the  different 
shades  of  opinion  that  were  to  be  found  in  the  conven- 
tion ;  and  in  the  list  of  its  members  will  be  found  the 
names  of  a  number  of  those  whom  the  State  delighted 
to  honor,  and  to  whom  their  fellow-citizens  now  looked 
for  counsel. 

On  the  9th  of  March  this  committee  made  a  report, 
which  is  a  model  of  clear,  compact  statement  and  close, 
dispassionate  reasoning.  In  it,  they  very  properly  draw 
a  distinction  between  the  action  of  individual  Northern 
States  and  of  the  federal  government ;  and  Avhilst  ad- 
mitting that  the  people  of  the  South  had  just  cause  of 
dissatisfaction  with  many  of  the  former,  they  take  oc- 
casion to  say  that,  thus  far,  there  had  been  no  intima- 
tion that  the  latter  had  ever  violated  any  of  the  rights  of 
the  Southern  States,  or  had  any  intention  of  doing  so. 
They  also  deemed  It  a  subject  of  congratulation  that, 
although  "  a  spirit  of  Insubordination  to  law,  unequaled, 
perhaps,  in  any  other  civilized  country,  reigned  through- 
out the  land,  yet  the  judicial  tribunals  of  the  federal 
government  had  not  failed,  in  any  case  that  had  been 
brought  before  them,  to  maintain  the  rights  of  Southern 
citizens,  and  to  punish  the  violators  of  these  rights." 
The  cause,  then,  of  the  present  condition  of  affairs,  they 


288  MISSOURI. 

continued,  was  to  be  found  In  "  the  alienated  feelings 
existing  between  the  Northern  and  Southern  sections  of 
the  country,  rather  than  in  the  actual  injury  suffered  by 
either ;  In  the  anticipation  of  future  evils,  rather  than  in 
the  pressure  of  any  now  actually  endured." 

In  regard  to  the  hostile  legislation,  which  In  almost 
all  of  the  Northern  States  had  taken  the  shape  of  per- 
sonal liberty  bills,  and  was  Intended  to  nullify  the  act 
of  Congress  for  the  return  of  fugitive  slaves,  the  com- 
mittee held,  and  very  justly,  that  It  was  unconstitutional. 
The  remedy  for  It,  they  maintained  with  equal  justice, 
was  provided  by  the  Constitution,  and  was  to  be  found 
not  In  secession,  or  "  its  equivalent,  revolution,"  but  In 
an  ajDpeal  to  the  supreme  court.  This  tribunal  was  the 
recognized  arbiter  In  all  such  cases,  and  there  was  no 
reason  to  supjiose  that  it  would  not  vindicate  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  Constitution  in  this  instance,  as  it  had  done 
In  all  others  which  had  been  submitted  to  it  for  adjudi- 
cation. 

Other  points  of  law  and  fact  which  we  must  dismiss 
with  a  bare  mention,  were  discussed  with  equal  clear- 
ness. In  conclusion,  the  committee,  in  a  few  pregnant 
paragraphs,  refer  to  the  destructive  effect  which  seces- 
sion, or  as  they  prefer  to  call  it  "  revolution,"  would 
entail  upon  the  best  Interests  of  the  State,  Including 
slavery  itself,  and  they  ask  what  under  the  circumstances 
is  the  position  Missouri  ought  to  assume  ?  To  this  they 
answer :  "  Evidently  that  of  a  State  whose  Interests  are 
bound  up  in  the  maintenance  of  the  Union,  and  whose 
kind  feelings  and  strong  sympathies  are  with  the  people 
of  the  Southern  States,  with  whom  we  are  connected  by 
ties  of  friendship  and  blood.  We  want  the  peace  and 
harmony  of  the  country  restored,   and  we  want  them 


MISSOURI  DECIDES  FOR  THE   UNION.        289 

with  us.  To  go  with  them  as  they  are  now  ...  is  to 
I'uin  ourselves  without  doing  them  any  good.  We  can- 
not now  follow  them  ;  we  cannot  now  give  up  the  Union  ; 
yet  we  will  do  all  in  our  power  to  induce  them  to  take 
their  places  with  us  in  the  family  from  which  they  have 
attempted  to  separate  themselves.  For  this  purpose  we 
will  not  only  recommend  a  compromise  "  (the  Critten- 
den proposition),  "  with  which  they  ought  to  he  satisfied, 
hut  we  Avill  unite  in  the  endeavor  to  procure  an  assem- 
hlage  of  the  whole  family  of  States,  in  order  that  in  a 
General  Convention  such  amendments  to  tlie  Constitu- 
tion may  be  agreed  upon  as  shall  permanently  restore 
hanuony  to  the  whole  nation."  Such  a  recommenda- 
tion, it  was  thought,  would  come  with  appropriateness 
and  effect  from  Missouri,  for  she  "  was  brought  foith  in 
a  storm,  and  cradled  in  a  compromise." 

Accompanying  this  report  was  a  series  of  resolutions 
which  was  adopted,  but  not  without  debate.  Among 
them,  the  fu'st  and  most  important  was  the  one  which 
declared  that  there  was  "  no  adequate  cause  to  impel 
]\Iissouri  to  dissolve  her  connection  with  the  Federal 
Union."  Upon  this,  there  was  practically  no  disagree- 
ment, the  vote  upon  its  adoption  being  eighty-nine  to 
one  —  Mr.  Bast  of  Montgomery.  The  others  were  of 
less  moment,  though  among  them  were  one*  or  two  that 
were  possessed  of  a  certain  interest,  not  so  much  on  ac- 
count of  any  effect  which  they  had  in  "  stilling  the  tem.- 
pest,"  as  from  the  fact  that  they  showed  how  tenaciously 
the  people  of  the  State  clung  to  the  fast-disappearing 
hope  of  a  compromise,  and  how  surely  the  loose  and 
shifting  Union  sentiment  was  crystallizing  into  uncon- 
ditional loyalty. 

This  latter  fact  was  made  especially  manifest  in  the 
course  of  the  debate  which  took  place  upon  an  amend- 


290  MISSOURI. 

ment  declaring  what  Missouri  would  do  in  case  the  North 
should  attempt  to  coerce  the  seceding  States  back  into 
the  Union.  Thus,  for  instance,  when  it  was  said  that 
she  would  never  furnish  a  regiment  for  any  such  purpose, 
William  A.  Hall  tersely  replied  that  Missouri  was  in  the 
Union,  and  it  was  her  duty  to  respond  to  all  demands 
that  the  federal  government  might  constitutionally  make 
upon  her.  This  was  certainly  plain  enough  ;  and  what 
was  more  to  the  point,  it  admitted,  logically,  of  no  satis- 
factory answer.  Nor  was  this  all.  Events  outside  of 
the  convention  had  moved  rapidly  of  late,  and  the  ques- 
tion now,  among  those  who  knew  whereof  they  spoke, 
was  not  what  Missouri  would  or  would  not  do,  but 
what  she  was  to  be  permitted  to  do.  "  Missouri  has 
not  the  power  to  go  out  of  the  Union  if  she  would,"  said 
James  0.  Broadhead  of  St.  Louis,  a  Virginian  by  birth 
and  one  of  Blair's  most  trusted  advisers,  in  the  course  of 
a  speech  in  which  he  pictured  the  State  as  standing  in 
the  pathway  to  the  Pacific,  and  urged  this  as  a  reason 
why  the  North  would  never  consent  to  her  secession. 
"  Missouri  has  not  the  power  to  go  out  of  the  Union  if 
she  would,"  he  repeated,  and  little  as  the  truth  of  the 
statement  was  then  suspected,  it  was  soon  seen  to  be 
fraught  with  meaning.  Read  in  the  light  of  subsequent 
events,  it  meant  that  the  arsenal  was  safe,  that  Blair  was 
ready  to  strike,  and  only  bided  his  time. 

The  adoption  of  this  report  virtually  closed  the  pro- 
ceedings of  the  convention,  and  on  the  22d  of  March  it 
adjourned  to  the  third  Monday  in  December,  but  not 
until  a  committee  had  been  appointed  with  power  to  call 
it  together  at  an  earlier  date,  should  such  a  course  be 
deemed  necessary.  On  the  28th  of  the  same  month  the 
General  Assembly,  which  of  late  had  been  chiefly  en- 
gaged in  local  legislation,  also  adjourned. 


CHAPTER   XIV. 

THE   ARSEKAL,    CAMP    JACKSON,    AXD   THE    SECOND 
MEETING    OF    THE    CONVENTION. 

The  refusal  of  President  Buchanan  to  withdraw  the 
Federal  ti-oops  from  Charleston,  and  his  evident  deter- 
mination to  regain  possession  of  the  forts  which  had  been 
surrendered  to  South  Carolina,  and  to  reinforce  those 
which  still  held  out,  hastened  the  action  of  Georgia  and 
the  Gulf  States,  and  led  them,  early  in  January,  1861, 
even  before  they  had  formally  seceded,  to  seize  the 
arsenals  and  such  other  public  jjroperty  as  were  within 
their  limits.  This  proceeding,  which  was  epigrammati- 
cally  described  by  Blair  as  ''  stealing  empty  forts  and 
full  treasuries,"  but  which  was  nothing  more  than  the 
practical  application  of  the  doctrine,  then  quite  common, 
of  state  sovereignty,  naturally  directed  the  attention  of 
the  leaders  of  the  different  political  parties  in  Missouri 
to  the  arsenal  in  St.  Louis,  and  set  them  to  work  planning 
how  they  might  get  control  of  the  forty  thousand  mus- 
kets and  other  munitions  of  war  which  it  was  known  to 
contain.  They  felt  that  uj^on  the  success  or  failure  of 
their  efforts  to  accomplish  this  purjjose  depended  the 
future  of  the  State ;  for  let  the  result  be  what  it  might, 
they  knew  the  party  that  obtained  those  guns  would  be 
able  to  hold  St.  Louis  and  Missouri,  by  virtue  of  its 
ability  to  arm  its  adherents. 

Impressed  with  this  belief,  and  satisfied   that  move- 


•292  MISSOURI. 

ments  were  on  foot  among  irresponsible  parties,  Union- 
ist as  well  as  Secessionist,  to  take  possession  of  this 
post,  General  D.  M.  Frost,  of  the  Missouri  state  militia, 
a  graduate  of  West  Point  and  a  thorough  soldier,  is  said 
to  have  called  Governor  Jackson's  attention  to  the  neces- 
sity of  "  looking  after  "  it,  so  that  the  State  might  be  in 
a  condition  to  arm  her  ti'oops,  as  he  was  satisfied  she 
would,  sooner  or  later,  have  to  do,  whether  she  fought 
for  the  Union  or  against  it,  or  whether,  having  declared 
for  neutrality,  she  simply  wished  to  make  her  position 
respected.  Jackson,  however,  needed  no  prompting. 
The  secession  of  the  cotton  States  had,  he  thought,  made 
disunion  an  accomplished  fact ;  and  as  he  had  long  since 
come  to  the  conclusion  that,  in  such  an  event,  Missouri's 
place  would  be  with  the  South,  and  as,  moreover,  he  had 
no  doubt  that  this  was  the  sentiment  of  the  people  of  the 
State  generally,  he  did  not  hesitate  to  give  Frost  author- 
ity to  seize  the  arsenal,  whenever  in  his  judgment  it 
might  become  necessary  to  do  so.  Meanwhile  he  was 
to  assist  in  protecting  it  against  mob  violence  of  any 
kind  or  from  any  source.  In  the  discharge  of  this 
duty,  Frost  called  upon  Major  William  H.  Bell,  the 
commandant  of  the  arsenal,  who  gave  him  to  understand 
that  whilst  he  was  determined  to  defend  the  post  against 
any  and  all  irresponsible  mobs,  come  from  whence  they 
might,  he  would  not  attempt  to  defend  it  against  the 
proper  State  authorities,  as  he  was  of  the  opinion  that, 
whenever  the  time  came,  the  State  had  the  right  to  claim 
it  as  being  on  her  soil.  He  also  promised  that  he  would 
not  suffer  any  arms  to  be  removed  from  the  place 
without  giving  notice  of  the  fact.  In  return,  Frost 
engaged  to  use  the  force  at  his  command  to  protect  the 
arsenal   from   the   assaults  of   all  persons   whatsoever, 


THE  ARSENAL   AND    CAMP  JACKSON.  29o 

though  he  frankly  avowed  that,  in  view  of  the  present 
defenseless  condition  of  the  place,  and  in  order  to  carry- 
out  this  purpose,  it  might  become  necessary  for  him  to 
come  down  and  quarter  troops  there,  to  wliich  Major 
Bell  assented.  These  assurances  were  satisfactory  to 
Frost,  as  they  were,  of  necessity,  to  the  small  but  active 
band  of  secessionists  which  had  been  organized  in  the 
city,  and  which,  as  we  have  seen,  was  held  in  check  by 
the  advice  of  friends  at  Jefferson  City  ;  and  they  fully 
justified  Frost,  who  had  every  confidence  in  Major  Bell's 
word,  in  declaring  that  he  should  now  rest  easy,  though 
he  intended  to  be  ''  prepared  with  the  proper  force  to  act 
as  emergency  might  require.'' 

Frost,  however,  was  not  the  only  person  in  St.  Louis 
■who  had  his  eyes  fixed  upon  the  arsenal  and  its  con- 
tents. Frank  Blair  was  looking  longingly  in  the  same 
direction,  and  was  already  busily  engaged  in  organizing 
the  bands  which,  supplied  with  guns  from  this  very 
storehouse,  enabled  him,  some  four  months  later,  to  lay 
such  a  heavy  hand  upon  Missouri,  Just  then,  it  is 
true,  he  could  not  arm  them,  for  except  the  few  muskets 
furnished  by  the  liberality  of  his  friends  and  through 
the  instrumentality  of  Governor  Yates  of  Illinois,  he 
Avas  without  the  necessary  means  ;  but  he  did  not  permit 
this  to  interfere  with  the  work  of  recruiting  and  drilling. 
That  went  on  steadily,  and  as  a  consequence,  when  the 
moment  came  for  action,  Blair  was  able  to  appear  at  the 
decisive  point  with  a  well-armed  force,  ten  times  as  numer- 
ous as  that  which  his  opponents  could  bring  against  him. 

In  the  mean  time,  whilst  these  two,  or  rather  three, 
parties  (for  Frost  can  hardly  be  termed  a  secessionist, 
though  as  an  officer  in  the  service  of  the  State  he  was 
willing  to   obey   the    orders  of    his   commander)   were 


294  MISSOURI. 

watching  each  other,  the  federal  government  awoke 
from  its  lethargy,  and  began  to  concentrate  troops  in  St. 
Louis  for  the  protection  of  its  property.  The  first  ar- 
rival, consisting  of  a  detachment  of  fort}^-seven  men, 
occurred  on  the  11th  of  January ;  on  the  24th,  the  very 
day  that  Frost  reported  to  the  governor  the  result  of 
his  visit  to  the  arsenal,  Major  Bell  was  relieved  from 
command  and  Major  Hagner  put  in  his  place  ;  and  by 
the  18th  of  February,  the  day  of  the  election  of  dele- 
gates to  the  convention  which  pronounced  so  decidedly 
against  secession,  there  were  between  four  and  five  hun- 
dred men  behind  the  arsenal  walls,  and  under  the  com- 
mand of  officers  who  would  not  have  hesitated  to  use 
them  in  defense  of  the  property  intrusted  to  their  care. 
With  such  a  force,  properly  handled  as  this  unquestion- 
ably would  have  been,  the  place  was  now  so  far  from 
being  in  need  of  "  protection,"  either  by  secessionists  or 
Union  men,  that  it  was  abundantly  able  to  take  care  of 
itself ;  and  General  Harney,  who  was  in  command  of 
the  department  and  presumably  familiar  with  its  con- 
dition, under  date  of  February  19,  notified  the  author- 
ities at  Washington  that  there  was  no  danger  of  an  at- 
tack, and  never  had  been.  "  If,"  added  he,  "  one  should 
be  made,  the  garrison  would  be  promptly  rescued  by  an 
overwhelming  force  from  the  city." 

Such  was  not  the  opinion  of  Captain  Nathaniel  Lyon, 
who  had  arrived  at  the  arsenal  on  the  6th  of  February, 
and  who  was  destined,  in  the  short  space  of  the  com- 
ing six  months,  to  write  his  name  indelibly  in  the  his- 
tory of  the  State.  He  was  at  this  time  forty-three 
years  of  age,  having  been  born  at  Ashford,  Con- 
necticut, in  July,  1818.  In  personal  appearance  he  is 
described  as  having  been  "of  less  than  medium  height; 


THE  ARSENAL   AND   CAMP  JACKSON.  295 

slender  and  angular ;  with  abundant  hair  of  a  sandy 
color,  and  a  coarse,  reddish-brown  beard.  He  had 
deep-set  blue  eyes;  features  that  were  rough  and 
homely ;  and  the  weather-beaten  aspect  of  a  man  who 
had  seen  much  hard  service  on  the  frontier,"  as,  in 
truth,  he  had.  Indeed,  it  is  quite  probable  that  it  was 
his  service  in  Kansas  during  the  troublous  days  of  which 
we  have  spoken,  the  scenes  which  he  had  then  witnessed 
and  in  some  of  which  he  had  been  an  actor,  that  had  so 
intensified  his  dislike  of  slavery  and  slaveholders  as  to 
make  him  forgetful,  at  times,  of  the  distinction  which 
should  be  drawn  between  the  sin  and  the  sinner.  In 
his  inability,  too,  to  see  more  than  one  side  of  a  ques- 
tion, and  in  the  terrible  earnestness  with  which  he  saw 
that,  he  betrayed  the  puritanical  bent  of  his  mind,  as  he 
also  did  in  his  impatience  of  conti'ol,  and  in  the  spirit  of 
intolerance  that  made  it  impossible  for  him  to  under- 
stand how  there  could  be  two  opinions  upon  a  subject 
upon  which  he  had  made  up  his  mind,  and  that  caused 
him  to  attribute  incapacity,  or  unworthy  and  improper 
motives,  to  any  one  who  ventured  to  differ  from  him,  or 
who  failed  to  approve  of  the  extreme  measures  to  which 
he  naturally  inclined.  This  last  characteristic  is  espe- 
cially noticeable  in  his  political  writings  and  in  his  treat- 
ment of  Major  Hagner,  whose  refusal  to  act  upon  his 
suggestions  for  strengthening  the  arsenal  is  said  to  have 
been  the  result  of  "imbecility  or  d — d  villainy."  It 
may  also  be  seen  in  his  denunciation  of  General  Scott's 
decision  awarding  the  command  of  the  arsenal  to 
Hagner  and  not  to  him,  which  we  are  told  was  made 
"  in  his  usual  sordid  spirit  of  partisanship  and  favoritism 
to  pets,  and  personal  associates,  and  toadies  ;  "  and  it  led 
him  to  question  Lincoln's  "  resolution  to  grapple  with 


296  MISSOURI. 

treason,  and  to  put  it  down  forever,"  and  to  express  the 
fear  that  "  he  was  not  the  man  for  the  hour,"  and  that 
"  our  political  triumph  had  been  in  vain." 

Qualities  like  these  are  hardly  of  a  character  to  com- 
mend their  possessor  to  men  of  moderate  views,  and 
hence  we  find  that  in  the  efforts  that  were  made  in  St. 
Louis  and  at  Washington  to  effect  Hagner's  removal 
and  Lyon's  installment  in  his  place,  the  latter  gentle- 
man received  but  httle  aid  from  men  of  a  conservative 
stamp.  Even  after  the  accession  of  Lincoln  and  the 
capture  of  Camp  Jackson,  his  advancement  was  opposed 
by  such  Union  men  as  Attorney  General  Edward  Bates, 
Hamilton  R.  Gamble,  the  president  of  the  convention, 
and  James  E.  Yeatman,  afterwards  so  well  known  as 
the  efficient  head  of  the  Western  Sanitary  Commission. 
On  the  other  hand  he  was  possessed  of  certain  soldier- 
ly qualities,  and  had  withal  a  military  way  of  untying 
political  and  legal  knots  that  appealed  at  once  to  men 
of  action,  like  Blair  and  Broadhead  and  the  other  mem- 
bers of  the  Union  Safety  Committee.  Through  all  this 
trying  period  they  supported  him  bravely  and  stead- 
fastly ;  and  it  was  due  in  great  part  to  their  ceaseless 
efforts  that  he  finally  succeeded  in  obtaining  the  ap- 
pointment which  gave  him  the  command  of  the  arsenal 
and  made  him  the  master  of  St.  Louis. 

As  yet  all  this  was  in  the  future.  President  Bu- 
chanan's term  of  office  stiU  had  a  month  to  run,  and  so 
long  as  he  remained  in  power  neither  Blair  nor  Lyon 
could  hope  for  any  special  favor.  All  that  they  or 
any  one  could  expect  was  that  he  would  take  care  that 
the  public  property  was  properly  defended,  and  this 
he  was  evidently  determined  to  do,  whether  the  attack 
came  from  Union  men  or  secessionists.     In  fact,  it  was 


THE  ARSENAL  AND   CAMP  JACKSON.  297 

owing  to  this  very  determination,  and  the  consequent 
concentration  of  troops  at  the  arsenal,  that  Lyon  now 
found  himself  in  St.  Louis,  and  engaged  in  the  con- 
genial occupation  of  drilling  and  disciplining  the  home 
guards,  thereby  transforming  them  from  an  unarmed 
mob  of  civilians  into  a  band  of  trained  soldiers,  ready 
to  defend,  or  if  need  be  take  the  arsenal,  and  prepared 
at  all  times  to  fight  for  the  Union. 

For  this  work  he  was  well  fitted,  not  only  by  his  mili- 
tary training,  but  also  by  his  tireless  energy  and  his  de- 
votion to  the  Union.  It  was  to  him  a  labor  of  love,  and 
such  was  the  zeal  he  brought  to  bear  in  its  prosecution, 
the  cheerful  coui'age  with  which  he  bore  up  under  the 
depressing  influence  of  hope  deferred,  and  the  confi- 
dence that  he  manifested  in  the  righteousness  of  the 
cause  in  which  he  was  engaged  and  in  its  ultimate  suc- 
cess, that  he  became  a  tower  of  strength  to  the  weak 
and  timid,  and  even  among  the  strong  and  courageous 
he  was  speedily  recognized  as  a  leader.  Under  the 
stimulating  influence  of  two  such  spirits  as  Blair  and 
himself,  the  work  of  preparation  went  bravely  on.  By 
the  middle  of  April,  four  regiments  had  been  enlisted, 
and  Lyon,  who  was  now  in  command  of  the  arsenal, 
though  not  of  the  department,  proceeded  to  arm  them 
in  accordance  with  an  order  which  Blair  had  jirocured 
from  Washington. 

Backed  by  this  force,  Blair  felt  strong  enough  to  set 
up  an  opposition  to  the  state  government,  and  accord- 
ingly, when  Jackson  refused  to  furnish  the  quota  of 
troops  assigned  to  Missouri  under  President  Lincoln's 
call  of  April  15,  1861,  he  telegraphed  to  Washington 
that  if  an  order  to  muster  the  men  into  the  service  was 
sent  to  Captain  Lyon,  "  the  requisition  would  be  filled  in 


298  MISSOURI. 

two  days."  The  ordev  was  duly  forwarded,  and  five 
regiments  having  been  sworn  in  instead  of  four,  as  called 
for,  Blair  was  offered  the  command.  This  he  declined, 
and,  on  his  recommendation,  Lyon  was  elected  in  his 
place.  On  the  7th  and  8th  of  May  another  brigade  was 
organized,  and  Captain  Thomas  W.  Sweeny,  of  the  2d 
Infantry,  was  elected  commander.  This  made  ten  regi- 
ments of  volunteers,  besides  several  companies  of  regu- 
lars and  a  battery  of  artillery,  that  were  now  ready  for 
service  ;  and  as  General  Harney,  whose  relatives  and 
associates  were  suspected  of  disloyalty,  had  been  ordered 
to  Washington  to  explain  his  position,  Lyon  was  virtually 
in  command  of  the  department.  The  wished-for  oppoi'- 
tnnity  had  come  at  last ;  and  Blair  and  Lyon,  no  longer 
trammeled  by  higher  authority,  and  determined  that 
Missouri  should  be  made  to  fight  for  the  Union  instead 
of  occupying  the  merely  negative  position  which  she  had 
taken  upon  the  question  of  secession,  were  now  at  liberty 
to  carry  out  their  plans. 

Meanwhile  the  February  election  had  passed  off  with- 
out disturbance,  and  resulted,  as  has  already  been  said, 
in  an  overwhelming  defeat  of  the  secessionists.  It  was 
a  fatal  blow  to  their  cause,  for  it  led  the  General  Assem- 
bly to  adjourn  without  taking  any  measures  to  put  the 
State  in  a  position  either  to  fight  or  to  defend  her  neu- 
trality. This,  of  course,  left  Governor  Jackson  power- 
less, and,  as  Snead  says,  "•  turned  Missouri  over,  unarmed 
and  defenseless,  to  Frank  Blair  and  his  home  guards." 
In  St.  Louis,  it  is  true,  a  small  and  gallant  band  of  young 
men,  under  the  lead  of  Basil  W.  Duke  and  Colton 
Greene,  both  of  whom  afterwards  held  high  command  in 
the  Confederate  service,  showed  a  disposition  to  contest 
the  prize  with  him,  but  their  efforts  came  to  naught. 


THE  ARSENAL   AND    CAMP  JACKSON.  299 

For  some  unexplained  reason,  although  possessed  of  ad- 
mirable recruiting  grounds,  they  never  numbered  over 
three  hundred  men  —  not  a  tenth  of  the  force  with 
which  Blair  stood  ready  to  overwhelm  them  ;  and  in  the 
end  they  wisely  dropped  their  organization  as  minute 
men,  and  formed  a  battalion,  which  was  assigned  to 
Frost's  brigade  of  the  state  militia. 

Jackson,  too,  though  possessed  of  but  little  actual 
power,  was  unwilling  to  give  up  the  contest  without  an 
effort.  He  did  not  accept  the  decision  of  the  February 
election  as  final,  and  as  his  views  in  regard  to  the  posi- 
tion that  Missouri  should  take  in  the  impending  struggle 
had  undergone  no  change,  he  showed  in  this  supreme 
moment  of  his  life  that  he  did  not  lack  the  courage  of 
his  convictions.  Repairing  to  St.  Louis  as  soon  as  the 
adjournment  of  the  General  Assembly  had  left  him  free, 
he  began  at  once,  in  conjunction  with  certain  leading 
secessionists,  to  concert  measures  for  arming  the  militia 
of  the  State,  and  thus  putting  her  in  a  condition  to  make 
her  action,  whatever  it  might  be,  effective.  To  this  end, 
the  seizure  of  the  arsenal  was  held  to  be  a  prerequisite, 
and  General  Frost  was  preparing  a  memorial  showing 
how  this  could  best  be  done,  when  the  surrender  of  Fort 
Sumter  and  the  President's  consequent  call  for  troops 
hurried  Jackson  into  a  position  of  antagonism  to  the 
federal  government,  though  no  one  knew  better  than 
he  how  inadequate  the  resources  of  the  State  were  to 
maintain  the  defiant  attitude  which  he  assumed.  How- 
ever, he  was  not  dismayed.  To  the  requisition  made 
upon  INIissouri  for  four  regiments  to  suppress  combina- 
tions, maintain  the  Union,  and  repossess  the  forts  which 
had  been  seized,  he  answered  that  she  would  not  send  a 
man  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  on  an  unholy  crusade 


300  MISSOURI. 

against  the  people  of  the  seceded  States.  Under  the 
circumstances,  this  was  a  rash  declaration,  for,  as  events 
subsequently  proved,  the  matter  had  already  passed  be- 
yond the  control  of  the  state  authorities,  though  Jackson 
knew  it  not ;  and  if  he  had,  it  is  questionable  whether 
it  would  have  made  any  difference  in  liis  official  action, 
as  he  was  determined,  if  possible,  to  place  Missouri 
where  he  thought  she  belonged,  on  the  side  of  the  South. 
Accordingly  he  sent  messengers  to  the  Confederate 
authorities  at  Montgomery,  Alabama,  asking  them  to 
supply  him  with  the  guns  that  were  needed  for  the  jjro- 
posed  attack  on  the  arsenal ;  and  he  summoned  the 
General  Assembly  to  meet  at  Jefferson  City  on  the  2d 
of  May,  to  deliberate  upon  such  measures  as  might  be 
deemed  necessary  for  placing  the  State  in  a  position  to 
defend  herself.  He  also  ordered,  as  he  was  authorized 
to  do  under  the  law,  the  commanders  of  the  several  mili- 
tary districts  to  hold  the  regular  yearly  encampments 
for  the  purpose  of  instructing  their  men  in  drill  and 
discipline.  And  here  it  is  worthy  of  note,  as  indicating 
the  motives  of  the  people  of  the  State,  that  the  law  under 
which  this  order  was  issued  was  introduced  into  the 
state  senate  by  General  Frost  in  1855,  and  was  in- 
tended, as  he  then  said,  to  provide  the  means  for  raising 
a  volunteer  force  of  fifty  thousand  men,  which  was  to  be 
used  in  "  preventing  our  Northern  and  Southern  brethren 
from  flying  at  each  other's  throats,  as  they  -will  probably 
do  at  the  next  presidential  election  in  1856,  or  passing 
that,  then  certainly  in  1860,  unless  the  border  States  take 
action  such  as  this  to  keep  the  peace."  The  bill,  we 
are  told,  was  passed,  but  not  until  it  was  shorn  of  the 
appropriation  which  alone  could  give  it  force,  though 
General  Simon  B.  Buckner  of  Kentucky,  who  "  shared 


THE  ARSENAL   AND   CAMP  JACKSON.  301 

in  these  fears  and  views  as  to  the  means  of  preventing 
their  realization,"  seems  to  have  had  better  success,  as 
he  is  said  to  have  "  obtained  a  copy  of  the  law  and 
passed  it  in  better  shape  through  the  legislature  of  his 
State."  For  this  curious  bit  of  unwritten  history  we 
are  indebted  to  General  Frost,  and  chimerical  as  the 
project  may  have  been,  it  is  of  interest  as  showing  that 
the  idea  of  neutrality  was  by  no  means  of  recent  origin 
in  the  border  States,  and  it  may  help  to  explain  the 
hold  which  that  idea  had  taken  upon  a  people  as  com- 
bative as  those  of  Kentucky  and  Missouri  showed  them- 
selves to  be. 

Returning  now  to  the  order  for  the  encampment,  we 
find  that  it  was  general,  though  practically  its  effect  was 
limited  to  the  first  or  Frost's  brigade,  as  that  was  the 
only  one  that  had  been  organized  under  the  law.  On 
the  3d  of  May,  this  little  band,  numbering  less  than 
seven  hundred  men,  pitched  their  tents  in  a  wooded  val- 
ley in  the  outskii'ts  of  the  city  of  St.  Louis,  and  named 
it  Camp  Jackson,  in  honor  of  the  governor.  It  is  de- 
scribed as  being  surrounded  on  all  sides,  at  short  range, 
by  commanding  hills  ;  it  was,  moreover,  ojien  to  a  charge 
of  cavalry  in  any  and  every  direction,  and  the  men 
were  supplied  with  but  five  rounds  of  ammunition  each, 
hardly  enough  for  guard  purjioses.  In  a  word,  it  was 
defenseless,  and  this  fact  is  believed  to  be  conclusive  in 
regard  to  the  peaceful  character  of  the  camp  as  it  was 
organized.  Whatever,  then,  may  have  been  Jackson's 
motives  when  he  oi'dered  its  formation,  and  there  is  but 
little  doubt  that  he  intended  to  take  advantage  of  any 
favorable  opportunity  that  might  have  occurred  for 
seizing  the  arsenal,  it  is  evident  that  Frost  did  not,  now, 
contemplate  any  such  action.     Independently  of  the  fact 


802  MISSOURI. 

that  the  removal  of  the  arms  to  a  place  of  safety  in 
Illinois  had  taken  away  the  occasion  for  such  a  course, 
he  was  too  good  a  soldier,  had  he  intended  any  such 
movement,  or  had  he  anticijiated  an  attack  from  Lyon, 
to  have  brought  his  small  command  within  easy  striking 
distance  of  ten  times  their  number  of  well-armed  men  ; 
nor  would  he  have  encamped  in  a  position  in  which, 
from  the  nature  of  the  ground,  it  was  impossible  to 
make  a  successful  defense. 

All  this  was,  of  course,  well  known  to  Lyon,  but  it  did 
not  satisfy  him  of  the  peaceful  character  of  the  camp. 
On  the  contrary,  we  are  told  by  his  biographer  that  he 
regarded  it  as  a  "  fearful  menace,  which  by  jorompt  ac- 
tion would  amount  to  no  more  than  bravado,  but  if  suf- 
fered to  continue  and  grow,  would  become  very  shortly 
a  source  of  serious  trouble,  and  might  result  in  terrible 
conflicts  in  the  very  streets  of  the  city."  These  gloomy 
anticipations  may  or  may  not  have  been  well  founded, 
but  in  either  case  it  Js  difficult  to  understand  why  Lyon 
should  have  concerned  himself  about  the  matter,  since 
he  was  not  a  guardian  of  the  peace  in  St.  Louis,  and, 
moreover,  he  was  even  then  engaged  in  maturing  a  plan 
that  certainly  threatened  the  peace  which  he  seemed  so 
anxious  to  preserve.  The  times,  however,  were  revolu- 
tionary, as  General  Scott  said  when  approving  of  an 
order  that  gave  the  Safety  Committee  power  to  declare 
martial  law  in  St.  Louis  ;  and  in  view  of  the  tremendous 
stake  for  which  Blair  and  Lyon  were  playing,  it  would 
have  been  too  much  to  expect  that  they  could  or  would 
square  their  conduct  by  the  rules  of  logic  any  more  than 
they  did  by  the  laws  of  the  State.  In  their  judgment, 
tlie  hour  had  come  when  the  interests  of  the  Union 
demanded  that  they  should  strike  down  the  legally  con- 


TBE  ARSENAL  AND   CAMP  JACKSON.  303 

stltuted  authorities  of  the  State,  and  revolutionary  as 
was  the  proceeding,  they  set  about  it  in  a  fashion  that 
left  no  doubt  as  to  the  thoroughness  with  which  they 
proposed  to  do  the  work. 

As  a  preliminary  step,  it  was  determined  to  seize 
Camp  Jackson  and  every  man  in  it,  and  hold  them  as 
prisoners  of  war.  At  a  meeting  of  the  Safety  Commit- 
tee Lyon  unfolded  this  plan,  and  gave  as  a  reason  for 
thinking  this  course  necessary,  that  a  longer  delay  might 
enable  the  camp  to  assume  proportions  so  formidable  as 
to  endanger  the  safety  of  the  State.  Blair,  Broadhead, 
O.  D.  Filley,  and  J.  J.  Witzig  agreed  with  him;  but 
Samuel  T.  Glover  and  John  How,  the  remaining  mem- 
bers of  the  committee,  though  desiring  the  capture  of  the 
place,  objected  to  the  time  and  manner  in  which  it  was 
proposed  to  take  it.  The  camp,  they  said,  had  a  legal 
existence  but  for  a  week,  five  days  of  which  had  already 
elapsed,  and  they  did  not  think  it  ought  to  be  attacked 
during  that  period.  Besides,  the  officers  in  command  of 
it  recognized  the  government  of  the  United  States,  and 
had  in  no  instance  disturbed  the  peace.  True,  there 
was  property  there,  believed  to  have  been  wrongly  taken 
from  the  government  arsenal  at  Baton  Rouge,  but  the 
way  to  reach  that  was  by  a  writ  of  replevin.  If  Gen- 
eral Frost  refused  to  respect  the  writ,  the  marshal  might 
then  call  upon  General  Lyon  for  assistance,  and  thus  the 
object  would  be  gained. 

In  reply  to  this,  Lyon  urged  the  impropriety  of  allow- 
ing Frost  to  prepare  for  resistance  when  the  whole  en- 
terprise could  be  managed  without  the  firing  of  a  gun. 
He  knew,  he  said,  the  camp  to  be  a  nest  of  traitors  ;  that 
the  legislature  was  in  secret  session,  and  even  then  a  new 
military  law  might  be  in  operation,  or,  if  not,  it  would 


804  MISSOURI. 

certainly  be  in  a  day  or  so.  Advices  from  all  parts  of 
the  State,  he  added,  Avere  discouraging  to  the  Union 
men,  and  the  rebels  were  gathering  in  strength,  and  he 
closed  with  the  significant  warning  that  General  Harney 
would  arrive  on  Sunday  (it  was  now  Thursday)  and  be 
once  more  in  command,  and  no  one  could  tell  what  he 
would  do. 

The  mention  of  Harney's  return  and  the  fear  as  to 
the  effect  of  his  peaceful  policy  are  said  to  have  decided 
Glover,  who  thereupon  agreed  to  the  necessity  of  break- 
ing up  the  camp,  though  he  still  held  to  the  opinion  that 
it  would  be  best  to  have  the  United  States  marshal  at 
the  head  of  the  attacking  column,  and  let  him  first  make 
a  demand  for  the  arms  which  the  Confederate  authori- 
ties had  forwarded  at  Jackson's  request,  and  which  were 
now,  by  Frost's  permission,  and  at  the  earnest  solicita- 
tion of  Mayor  Taylor,  deposited  outside  the  front  en- 
trance to  the  camp.  Lyon  opposed  this  jjlan  as  being 
in  the  nature  of  a  subterfuge,  and  in  a  private  consulta- 
tion with  Blair  he  announced  his  intention  of  seizing  the 
entire  force  at  the  camp,  without  any  ceremony  other 
than  a  demand  for  its  surrender.  "  This  demand  he 
would  make  with  his  men  in  line  of  battle  and  his  guns 
in  position,  and  if  it  was  not  complied  with  at  once,  he 
would  fight  for  it."  ^  The  next  day  —  the  last  of  the 
encampment  —  Frost,  who  had  heard  of  the  proposed 
attack,  sent  a  letter  to  Lyon,  in  which  he  denied  that  he 
or  any  pai-t  of  his  command  were  actuated  by  hostile 
intentions   towards   the  federal   government ;    but  that 

^  For  this  account  of  the  meetings  of  the  Safety  Committee, 
and  for  many  other  facts  connected  with  this  most  eventful 
period,  I  am  indebted  to  General  Nathaniel  Lyon  and  Missouri  in 
1861,  by  James  Peckham.     New  York,  1866. 


THE  ARSENAL   AND    CAMP  JACKSON.  805 

ofiBcer,  liaving  matured  his  plans  for  taking  the  camp, 
refused  to  receive  it.  Frost  also  notified  Glover,  How, 
and  other  members  of  the  Safety  Conmiittee,  that  he 
knew  nothing  and  cared  nothing  about  the  arms  said  to 
have  been  taken  from  Baton  Rouge  and  now  deposited 
at  the  entrance  to  his  camp  ;  that  he  had  no  claim  on 
them  and  no  orders  regarding  them,  and  that  if  the 
United  States  marshal  wanted  them  he  was  welcome 
to  come  and  take  them  away.  These  protestations 
were  of  no  avail,  as  Lyon  had  made  up  his  mind  that 
the  time  had  come  for  action.  He  seems  to  have 
thought,  as  was  said  by  Blair  in  his  letter  to  the  Presi- 
dent, that  to  seize  Camp  Jackson  and  follow  it  up  "  by 
blows  struck  at  the  enemy  in  other  parts  of  the  State 
would  speedily  and  effectually,  and  at  small  cost  of  life 
and  treasure,"  crush  the  rebellion  in  the  State.  In  this 
he  was  no  doubt  coi'rect,  though  it  is  probable  that  the 
result,  when  achieved,  would  have  been  due  not  so  much 
to  the  "blows"  which  he  proposed  to  strike,  as  to  the 
fact  that  except  Governor  Jackson  and  his  adherents  or 
"  clique,"  as  Postmaster  General  Blair  styled  them,  there 
were  no  rebels  in  the  State.  Missouri,  it  will  be  remem- 
bered, had  just  given  a  majority  of  eighty  thousand 
against  secession,  and  to  suppose  that  the  Union  men 
of  the  State  could  have  been  duped  or  driven  into  an  op- 
posite course  by  less  than  one  fourth  of  their  number  is 
preposterous,  and  it  was  so  considered  by  those  who  may 
be  said  to  have  been  most  directly  interested. 

Lyon,  however,  was  not  to  be  turned  from  his  purpose 
by  such  considerations,  any  more  than  he  was  by  peaceful 
protestations  or  legal  obstacles.  Putting  his  troops  in 
motion  early  in  the  morning  of  the  10th  of  May,  he 
surrounded  Camp  Jackson  and  demanded  its  surrender. 


306  MISSOURI. 

As  Frost  could  make  no  defense  against  the  overwhelm- 
ing odds  brought  against  him,  he  was  of  course  obliged 
to  comply ;  and  his  men,  having  been  disarmed,  were 
marched  to  the  arsenal,  where  they  were  paroled  —  all 
except  Captain  Emmett  McDonald,  who  refused  to  ac- 
cept his  release  upon  the  terms  offered,  and  was  finally 
set  free  by  the  action  of  the  courts. 

After  the  surrender,  and  whilst  the  prisoners  were 
standing  in  line,  waiting  for  the  order  to  march,  a  crowd 
of  men,  women,  and  cliildren  collected  and  began  to 
abuse  the  home  guards,  attacking  them  with  stones  and 
other  missiles.  It  is  even  said  that  several  shots  were 
fired  at  them,  but  this  lacks  confirmation.  According 
to  Frost,  who  was  at  the  head  of  the  column  of  prison- 
ers, the  first  intimation  of  firing  was  given  by  a  single 
shot,  followed  almost  immediately  by  volley  firing,  which 
is  said  to  have  been  executed  with  precision  considering 
the  rawness  of  the  troops.  When  the  fusillade  was 
checked,  it  was  found  that  twenty-eight  persons  had 
been  killed  or  mortally  wounded,  among  whom  were 
three  of  the  prisoners,  two  women,  and  one  child.  In 
justice  to  the  federal  troops,  it  must  be  added  that  one 
of  them  was  killed ;  and  if  we  may  credit  Peckham, 
Captain  Blandowski,  of  the  third  (Sigel's)  regiment, 
whose  company  began  the  shooting,  died  the  next  day 
fi'om  the  effect  of  a  wound  received  at  the  hands  of  the 
excited  crowd  before  he  gave  the  order  to  fire. 

Judging  this  action  by  the  reasons  assigned  for  it,  and 
by  its  effect  throughout  the  State,  it  must  be  pronounced 
a  blunder.  So  far  from  intimidating  the  secessionists, 
it  served  only  to  exasperate  them ;  and  it  drove  not  a 
few  Union  men,  among  them  General  Sterling  Price, 
into  the  ranks  of  the  opposition  and  ultimately  into  the 


THE  ARSENAL   AND   CAMP  JACKSON.  807 

Confederate  army.  That  Blair  and  Lyon  were  honest 
and  sincere  in  what  they  said  is  not,  for  a  moment, 
doubted ;  but  this  can  hardly  be  considered  as  a  full 
justification  of  their  conduct.  Even  after  admitting  all 
that  can  be  brought  forward  in  their  favor  and  against 
Jackson,  there  will  remain  the  fact  that  in  seizing  the 
camp  they  were  actuated  not  so  much  by  anything  that 
had  taken  place,  as  by  their  fears  of  what  might  here- 
after be  done.  Such  an  explanation  is  but  a  phase  of 
the  tyrant's  plea  of  necessity,  and  whilst  there  are  times 
when  it  is  satisfactory,  it  is  not  in  the  present  instance, 
for  the  reason  that  Blair  and  Lyon  both  knew  that  one 
effort  had  already  been  made  to  detach  Missouri  from 
the  Union,  and  had  failed ;  and  they  had  no  reason  to 
suppose  that  a  second  attempt  would  be  any  more  suc- 
cessful. In  taking  the  course  they  did,  then,  they  were 
in  open,  flagrant  revolt  against  the  State ;  and  so  far  as 
their  action  was  dictated  or  sanctioned  by  the  authorities 
at  Washington,  the  capture  of  Camp  Jackson  was  an  act 
of  war  perpetrated  by  the  federal  government  upon  a 
State  which  was  as  much  a  part  of  the  Union  as  was 
Illinois  or  Iowa. 

When  the  news  of  the  seizure  reached  Jefferson  City 
the  General  Assembly  was  in  secret  session  ;  and  if  a 
proof  of  its  ill-effect  upon  the  people  of  the  State,  or  a 
measure  of  it,  be  needed,  it  will  be  found  in  the  influ- 
ence it  exerted  upon  the  members  of  that  body  and  the 
legislation  to  which  it  led.  Thus  we  find  that  the  mili- 
tary bill,  as  it  was  called,  was  then  under  consideration, 
and  that  its  opponents  were  contesting  its  passage,  striv- 
ing by  every  device  known  to  parliamentary  warfare  to 
deprive  it  of  the  features  that  made  it  olijectionable  to 
the   Union  men.     It  was  the  same  measure    that   had 


308  MISSOURI. 

been  rejected  at  the  previous  session  of  the  legislature ; 
the  men  who  defeated  it  then  were  opposing  it  now, 
and  there  was  no  reason  to  believe  that  the  result  would 
have  been  different ;  and  yet,  such  was  the  revulsion  of 
feeling  caused  by  the  ill-advised  attack  upon  the  state 
troops,  that  in  less  than  fifteen  minutes  from  the  time 
that  the  news  was  received,  the  bill  was  rushed  through 
both  branches  of  the  General  Assembly  in  the  shape 
in  which  it  had  been  originally  introduced,  the  amend- 
ments that  were  intended  to  render  it  less  objection- 
able having  been  rescinded.  Resolutions  denouncing 
the  conduct  of  Blair  and  Lyon  were  also  passed,  and 
the  governor  was  unanimously  requested  to  call  out  the 
militia  for  the  purpose  of  defending  the  State.  Other 
and  more  extreme  measures  were  also  adopted,  but  it  is 
unnecessary  to  specify  them,  as,  owing  to  the  rapid 
march  of  events,  this  General  Assembly  soon  ceased  to 
be  a  factor  in  Missouri  politics,  and  these  enactments 
died  with  it. 

Fortunately  for  the  State,  and  perhaps  for  the  Union, 
the  question  of  secession  was  not  one  of  those  upon 
which  the  legislature  could  take  action.  That  matter 
had  been  referred  to  the  convention  ;  and  the  wisdom 
that  led  this  body,  when  its  ostensible  work  was  fin- 
ished, to  take  a  recess  instead  of  adjourning  finally, 
was  now  fully  justified.  By  adopting  this  course  it  was, 
constructively,  still  in  existence,  and  so  long  as  this 
was  the  case,  the  question  of  the  secession  of  Missouri 
was  within  its  control,  and  the  General  Assembly  was 
powerless  to  act  in  the  matter. 

But  whilst  this  was  undeniably  true,  it  was  equally 
true  that  there  was  no  reason  why  the  General  Assem- 
bly should  not  arm  and  equip  the  state  troops,  or  take 


SECOND   MEETING    OF   THE   CONVENTION.      309 

any  constitutional  measures  that  might  he  deemed  nec- 
essary to  secure  the  enforcement  of  the  laws ;  and  this 
was  jjrecisely  what  it  claimed  to  be,  doing  when  it  au- 
thorized the  enlistment  of  a  body  of  troops  to  be  known 
as  the  state  guard.  Under  the  terms  of  this  law,  the 
governor  was  empowered  to  appoint  a  major-general, 
who  was  to  be  in  command  of  the  entire  force,  and  eight 
brigadier-generals,  who  were  to  have  control  of  the  sev- 
eial  military  districts  into  which  the  State  was  divided. 
To  the  first  of  these  positions  Sterling  Price,  the  presi- 
dent of  the  convention,  was  appointed,  and,  to  the  great 
delight  of  the  secessionists,  he  accepted.  Volunteers  at 
once  began  to  flock  to  Jefferson  City,  and  in  a  week 
from  the  time  that  Blair  and  Lyon  had  thrown  down 
their  gage  of  battle,  a  regiment  was  formed,  of  which 
John  S.  Mannaduke,  the  late  governor  of  the  State,  was 
made  colonel. 

Meanwhile  General  Harney  had  returned  to  St. 
Louis  and  resumed  command  of  the  department.  He 
approved  of  the  capture  of  Camp  Jackson,  and  on  the 
14th  of  May  he  issued  a  proclamation,  in  which  he  an- 
nounced that  the  whole  jjower  of  the  United  States 
would,  if  necessary,  be  exerted  to  maintain  the  State  in 
her  present  position  in  the  Union.  Upon  this  point  he 
was  explicit,  but  beyond  this  he  seems  to  have  had  no 
other  wish  than  to  preserve  the  peace.  To  this  end  he 
invited  General  Price  to  an  interview,  in  which  it  was 
agreed  that  the  latter  officer  should  be  intrusted  with 
the  duty  of  keeping  order  within  the  State,  subject  to 
tlie  laws  of  the  general  and  state  governments.  If  this 
were  done,  the  people  were  assured  by  Harney  that  he 
would  have  no  occasion,  as  he  had  no  wish,  to  make 
military  movements  which  might  create  excitement  and 


310  M/SSOURL 

jealousies.  In  accordance  with  this  agreement,  Price 
dismissed  the  troops  which  had  assembled  at  Jefferson 
City,  though,  in  reply  to  a  suggestion  of  Harney,  he  is 
said  to  have  answered  that  he  had  no  power  to  suspend 
the  organization  of  the  state  guard,  as  that  was  carried 
on  under  a  law  of  the  State  which  must  be  obeyed  until 
it  was  repealed,  or  decided  to  be  unconstitutional  by  com- 
petent authority. 

This  agreement  which,  according  to  Harney,  produced 
a  good  effect  throughout  the  State,  was  by  no  means 
satisfactory  to  Blair  and  Lyon.  They  did  not  want  the 
State  to  be  neutral,  nor  did  they  intend  that  she  should 
be.  What  they  wanted  was  that  she  should  be  made  to 
fight  for  the  Union  ;  and  as  this  could  not  be  effected 
whilst  Jackson  was  in  authority,  they  determined  to  de- 
pose him  and  drive  him  from  the  State.  But  before 
this  could  be  done  it  was  necessary  to  get  rid  of  Har- 
ney ;  and  accordingly  they  set  to  work  to  bring  this 
about.  A  circular  signed  by  0.  D.  Filley,  one  of  the 
safety  committee,  was  sent  to  loyal  men  throughout  the 
State,  in  which  they  were  asked  to  write  frequently  to 
headquai'ters  in  St.  Louis,  and  give  any  information 
they  might  have  as  to  the  organization  of  ti'oops  under 
the  military  law.  They  were  also  asked  to  forward  ac- 
counts of  any  outrages  of  which  they  had  cognizance^ 
that  might  be  perpetrated  by  secessionists  upon  Union 
men ;  and  they  were  earnestly  recommended,  in  viola- 
tion, it  was  claimed,  of  the  Price-Harney  agreement,  to 
organize  "  as  fast  as  possible  —  with  arms,  if  to  be  had, 
if  net,  without  them."  In  response  to  this  circular,  the 
committee  was  flooded  with  letters  from  all  parts  of  the 
State  ;  and  if  we  may  judge  of  the  whole  number  from 
those  that  were  published,  they  were  not  of  a  character 


SECOND   MEET  TNG    OF   THE  CONVEXTIOy.      311 

to  entitle  them  to  any  great  amount  of  credence.  They 
consisted  chiefly  of  rumors  that  were  afterwards  proved 
to  he  false,  and  inferences  based  upon  them,  all  of  which 
were  gravely  stated  as  facts.  In  one  case,  —  and  it  is 
a  fair  sample  of  all.  —  a  loyal  gentleman,  writing  from 
the  soutliAvestern  portion  of  the  State,  tells  us  that  in 
that  region  "  the  people  are  overwhelmed  with  terror 
and  fright,"  though  he  admits  that  at  that  time  there 
were  in  the  town  in  which  he  lived  eight  hundred  home 
guards  already  nmstered  into  service  ;  and  General 
Sweeny,  writing  from  the  same  place,  six  weeks  later, 
says  that  the  people  in  that  vicinity  were  generally  loyal, 
and  that  since  his  arrival  he  had  organized  several  regi- 
ments of  Union  troops.  Stories  like  these  were  eagerly 
collected,  and  although  General  Harney  discredited 
them,  and  on  more  than  one  occasion  bore  official  testi- 
mony to  the  fidelity  with  which  Price  was  carrying  out 
his  part  of  the  agreement,  yet  they  had  the  desired  effect 
upon  Lincoln,  to  whom  they  were  duly  forwai'ded.  In 
fact,  so  impressed  was  he  with  their  truth,  and  with  the 
sufferings  and  dancrers  to  which  the  Union  men  of  the 
State  were  said  to  be  exposed,  that  he  issued  an  order, 
or  rather  a  series  of  instructions,  in  which  Harney  was 
enjoined  to  put  a  stop  to  "these  outrages"  by  the  aid  of 
the  troops  under  his  command,  and  with  such  assistance 
from  Kansas,  Iowa,  and  Illinois  as  he  might  require. 
He  was  also  told  that  the  state  officers  were  not  to  be 
trusted  ;  that  the  authority  of  the  United  States  was 
paramount ;  and  that  whenever  it  was  apparent  that  a 
movement,  whether  by  color  of  state  authoritj'  or  not, 
was  hostile,  he  must  put  it  down.  These  instructions 
indicate  very  plainly  the  light  in  which  Missouri  was 
now  regarded  at  Washington,  and  the  position  to  which 


312  MISSOURI. 

it  was  proposed  to  reduce  her ;  and  they  are  reproduced 
here  simply  for  that  reason,  as  Harney  did  not  receive 
them  until  he  was  no  longer  in  a  situation  to  carry  them 
out,  the  order  relieving  him  of  the  command  having 
been  delivered  to  him  by  Blair  on  the  30th  of  May. 

The  dismissal  of  Harney  left  Lyon  once  more  at  the 
head  of  the  Federal  troops  in  Missouri.  As  his  inten- 
tions in  regard  to  the  State  were  well  known,  both 
sides  began  to  prepare  for  war  ;  but  before  hostilities 
were  begun,  an  effort  was  made  by  Thomas  T.  Gantt, 
William  A.  Hall,  and  other  well-known  citizens  to  bring 
about  an  agreement  between  the  rival  parties  which 
would  give  a  promise  of  peace  to  the  State.  To  this 
end  a  meeting  was  arranged,  and  took  place  in  St. 
Louis  on  the  11th  of  June,  in  which  Blair,  Lyon,  and 
Major  Conant  represented  the  federal  government,  and 
Price,  Jackson,  and  Colonel  Thomas  L.  Snead  appeared 
for  the  State,  but  it  came  to  naught.  After  some  hours 
spent  in  a  fruitless  discussion,  Lyon,  who  was  still 
seated,  closed  the  interview  in  the  following  words, 
spoken  "  slowly,  deliberately,  and  with  peculiar  empha- 
sis :  '  Rather  than  concede  to  the  State  of  Missouri  the 
right  to  demand  that  my  government  shall  not  enlist 
troops  within  her  limits,  or  bring  troops  into  the  State 
whenever  it  pleases,  or  move  its  troops  at  its  own  will 
into,  out  of,  or  through  the  State  ;  rather  than  concede 
to  the  State  of  Missouri  for  one  single  instant  the  right 
to  dictate  to  my  government  in  any  matter  however  un- 
imj)ortant,  I  would '  (rising  as  he  said  this,  and  pointing 
in  turn  to  every  one  in  the  room)  '  see  you,  and  you, 
and  you,  and  you,  and  you,  and  every  inan,  woman,  and 
child  in  the  State,  dead  and  buried.'  Then  turning  to 
the  s'^vernor  he  said  :   '  This  means  war.     In  an  hour 


SECOND  MEETING   OF  THE   CONVENTION.      313 

one  of  my  officers  will  call  for  you  and  conduct  you  out 
of  my  lines.'  And  then,"  continues  Snead,  "  without 
another  word,  without  an  inclination  of  the  head,  with- 
out even  a  look,  he  turned  upon  his  heel  and  strode  out 
of  the  room,  rattling  his  spurs  and  clanking  his  sabre, 
while  we,  whom  he  had  left,  and  who  had  known  each 
other  for  years,  bade  farewell  to  each  other  courteously 
and  kindly,  and  separated  —  Blair  and  Conant  to  fight 
for  the  Union,  we  for  the  land  of  our  birth." 

Returning  to  Jefferson  City,  Jackson  forthwith  issued 
a  proclamation  in  which  he  announced  the  result  of  the 
interview  in  St.  Louis ;  spoke  of  the  humiliating  con- 
cessions he  had  been  willing  to  make  in  order  to  avert 
the  horrors  of  civil  war,  of  their  contemptuous  rejection 
by  Lyon,  and  the  declaration  that  the  administration 
intended  to  take  military  possession  of  the  State  and  re- 
duce it  to  the  condition  of  Maryland  ;  and  he  closed  by 
calling  out  fifty  thousand  of  the  militia  for  the  purpose 
of  repelling  the  attack  that  had  been  made  upon  the 
State,  and  for  the  protection  of  the  lives,  liberties,  and 
property  of  her  citizens.  He  also  sent  orders  to  the 
commanders  of  the  different  military  districts  to  assem- 
ble .  their  men  and  prepare  for  active  service.  This 
done,  and  warned  by  the  rumors  of  Lyon's  approach,  he 
left  on  the  13th  of  June  for  Boonville,  where  he  found 
General  John  B.  Clark,  with  several  hundred  of  the  men 
of  Marmaduke's  regiment,  awaiting  his  arrival.  Here 
he  determined  to  make  a  stand,  more  to  give  the  state 
troops  which  had  been  organized  on  the  north  side  of 
the  river  time  to  join  him,  than  from  any  expectation 
of  being  able  to  hold  the  place  permanently.  In  fact, 
General  Price  had  already  decided  that,  being  without 
artilleiy  and  having  his  men  armed  only  with  shotguns 


314  MISSOURI. 

and  hunting  rifles,  it  \yould  be  impossible  for  him  to 
defend  the  line  of  the  Missouri ;  and  consequently  he 
had  gone  to  Lexington,  to  prepare  the  troops  there  for 
moving  to  some  point  near  the  Arkansas  border,  where 
he  could  organize  and  equip  them  under  the  protection 
of  McCulloch  and  the  Confederates. 

In  the  mean  time  Lyon  was  not  idle.  Having  resolved 
upon  war,  he  lost  no  time  in  making  such  a  disposition 
of  his  troops  as  would  enable  him  to  carry  it  on  to  the 
best  advantage.  A  brigade,  consisting  of  three  regi- 
ments of  infantry  and  two  batteries  of  artillery,  under 
the  command  of  General  Sweeny,  was  sent  to  Spring- 
field, charged  with  the  double  duty  of  watching  McCul- 
loch, and  of  intei'cepting  the  retreat  of  Jackson  and  the 
state  guard,  against  whom  Lyon  proposed  to  march  in 
person,  and  whom  he  intended  if  possible  to  drive  back, 
in  that  direction,  out  of  the  State. 

In  pursuance  of  the  part  of  the  work  he  had  marked 
out  for  himself,  Lyon  set  out  from  St.  Louis  on  the  13th 
of  June,  the  very  day  that  Jackson  left  Jefferson  City. 
On  the  loth  he  took  peaceable  possession  of  that  place, 
and  on  the  17th,  after  a  slight  skirmish,  fought  in  obe- 
dience to  Jackson's  order,  but  against  the  advice  of  ]\Iar- 
maduke,  he  captured  Boonville,  and  obliged  the  state 
troops  to  beat  a  hasty  retreat  towards  the  southwestern 
portion  of  the  State.  He  was,  however,  in  no  condition 
to  follow  up  his  success,  and  during  the  two  weeks  and 
more  that  he  was  detained,  reorganizing  his  command 
and  waiting  for  transportation,  etc.,  Jackson  crossed  the 
Osage  and  effected  a  junction  with  the  troops  from 
Lexington,  who  were  also  in  full  retreat,  followed  by 
Major  Sturgis,  with  nine  hundred  regulars  and  two  regi- 
ments of  Kansas  volunteers. 


SECOND  MEETING    OF    THE   CONVENTION.      315 

Jackson's  force  now  amounted  to  between  six  and 
seven  thousand  men  —  a  formidable  array  as  then 
reckoned,  though  practically  it  was  but  little  better  than 
a  rabble,  being  without  organization  and  poorly  sup])lied 
with  arms  and  equipments.  A  third,  perhaps,  of  the 
men  were  without  guns  of  any  kind,  but  as  an  offset, 
they  had  a  surplus  of  baggage,  some  of  which,  as.  for 
example,  the  feather  beds  and  frying  paos,  were  scarcely 
suited  to  a  column  in  light  marching  order. 

Continuing  his  retreat  southward,  Jackson,  on  the 
morning  of  the  5th  of  July,  found  his  further  progress 
barred  by  a  force,  consisting  of  about  a  thousand  men, 
under  Colonel  Sigel,  who  had  thrown  himself  in  the 
way,  for  the  purpose  of  liolding  him  in  check  until  Lyon 
and  Sturgis  coidd  come  up  and  by  an  attack  in  the  rear 
complete  his  destruction.  The  approach  of  this  new 
enemy  was  a  surj^rise  to  Jackson,  but  it  did  not  discon- 
cert him.  On  the  contrary,  taking  a  i)osition  on  the 
ridge  of  the  prairie,  nine  miles  north  of  Carthage,  he 
awaited  the  attack  of  the  Federal  troops.  This  was 
promptly  begun  with  artillery,  to  which  the  batteries  of 
Guibor  and  Bledsoe  replied,  apparently  without  much 
damage  to  either  side.  After  an  hour  of  this  practice, 
Jackson  ordered  certain  changes  in  the  position  of  his 
troops,  which  gave  Sigel  the  impression  that  he  was 
about  to  be  surrounded.  To  prevent  this,  he  ordered  a 
retreat,  which  was  well  conducted,  though  he  did  not 
consider  it  safe  to  halt  for  rest  or  food  until  he  reached 
Sarcoxie,  a  town  situated  fifteen  miles  beyond  Carthage 
on  the  road  to  Springfield.  The  day  after  the  battle, 
Jackson  entered  Carthage,  and  here  he  was  met  by  Gen- 
eral Price,  who  had  preceded  him  to  Arkansas,  and  at 
whose  solicitation  McCulloch  had  crossed  the  border  and 


316  MISSOURI. 

come  to  the  rescue,  with  sevei'al  regiments  of  Confeder- 
ate and  Arkansas  state  troops.  Finding  that  they 
were  not  in  danger  of  pursuit,  for  Lyon  and  Sturgis 
had  been  delayed  by  high  water  in  the  Osage  and  other 
streams,  McCulloeh  and  Price,  who  now  assumed  com- 
mand of  the  Missourians,  moved  slowly  back,  the  former 
to  his  old  position  near  Maysiield,  Arkansas,  whilst  the 
latter  pitched  liis  camp  on  Cowskin  Prairie,  in  the  ex- 
treme southwestern  corner  of  the  State.  Here,  as  we 
are  told  by  Quartermaster  -  General  James  Harding, 
"prairie  grass,  lean  beef,  and  water,"  were  plentiful, 
though  there  seems  to  have  been  a  lamentable  scarcity 
of  everything  else  that  an  army,  in  active  service,  is 
usually  supposed  to  need  in  the  way  of  food  and  sup- 
plies. 

Price  now  began  in  earnest  the  work  of  organizing 
and  arming  his  men  ;  and  to  any  one  not  familiar  with 
the  ready  methods  of  the  frontier,  it  must  have  appeared 
a  hopeless  task.  Powder  he  had,  owing  to  the  fore- 
sight of  Governor  Jackson,  and  the  Granby  mines  fur- 
nished liim  with  lead  ;  but  beyond  this  he  had  nothing, 
"  neither  arms  nor  military  stores  of  any  kind,  and  no 
money  to  buy  them,  if  any  had  been  for  sale."  Uni- 
forms were,  of  course,  out  of  the  question,  but  this  diffi- 
culty he  obviated  by  causing  bits  of  red  flannel  or  white 
cotton  to  be  tied  around  the  arms  of  the  officers.  To 
add  to  his  perplexities,  there  were  but  few  ti'ained  sol- 
diers with  him.  Even  the  officers  of  his  staff,  except 
Colonel  Little,  who  left  for  "Washington  on  the  19th  of 
July,  were  ignorant  of  their  duties.  His  chief  of  ord- 
nance. Colonel  Snead,  who  tells  the  story,  "  did  not 
know  the  difference  between  a  siege  gun  and  a  howitzer, 
and  had  never  seen  a  musket  cartridge."     Fortunately, 


SECOND   MEETING    OF    THE    CONVENTION.     317 

he  had  under  him  men  who  had  sei'ved  in  Mexico 
with  Price  or  Doniphan,  or  who  had  passed  their 
hves  upon  the  frontier,  and  were  accustomed  to  meet 
and  overcome  such  difficuhies.  Major  Thomas  H. 
Price,  for  instance,  knew  how  to  convert  the  neighhor- 
ing  forest  trees  into  huge  bullet  moulds,  and  in  a  few 
days  his  improvised  ordnance  shop  turned  out  bullets 
and  buckshot  enough  to  satisfy  the  immediate  wants  of 
the  corhmand.  Guibor,  too,  whose  guns  were  heard  in 
every  battle  in  which  the  state  guard  had  a  part,  soon 
had  an  '"  arsenal  of  construction "  in  working  order, 
and  with  some  of  Sigel's  captured  shot  as  models,  was 
busy  making  cartridges  for  his  cannon.  "  A  turning- 
lathe  in  Carthage  supplied  sabots  ;  the  owner  of  a  tin- 
shop  contributed  straps  and  canisters  ;  iron  rods  which 
a  blacksmith  gave  and  cut  into  small  pieces  made  good 
slugs  for  the  canisters ;  and  a  bolt  of  flannel,  w4th 
needles  and  thread,  freely  donated  by  a  dry-goods  man, 
provided  us  with  material  for  our  cartridge  bags.  A 
bayonet  made  a  good  candlestick  ;  and  at  night  .  .  .  the 
men  went  to  work  making  cartridges  ;  strapping  shot  to 
the  sabots,  and  filling  the  bags  from  a  barrel  of  powder 
placed  some  distance  from  the  candle.  .  .  .  My  first 
cartridge  resembled  a  turnip  rather  than  the  trim  cyl- 
inders from  the  Federal  arsenals,  and  would  not  enter 
a  gun  on  any  terms.  But  we  soon  learned  the  trick, 
and  at  the  cldge  range  at  which  our  next  battle  was 
fought,  our  home-made  ammunition  proved  as  effective 
as  the  best."  ^ 

In  the  quartermaster    and   commissary  departments, 
things  were  in  an  equally  crude  state.     General  James 

^  Lieutenant  Barlow,  of  Guibor's  battery,  in  the  St.  Louis  Re- 
publican, of  March  1,  1SS5. 


318  MISSOURI. 

Harding,  the  present  chairman  of  the  board  of  railroad 
commissioners  of  the  State,  has  given  an  amusing  ac- 
count of  the  difficulties  and  perplexities  that  beset  him, 
during  his  career  as  quartermaster-general  of  the  state 
guard  ;  and  speaking  of  this  very  period,  he  tells  us 
with  delicious  frankness  that  "  we  did  not  have  any  too 
much  to  eat,  and  at  one  time  rations  were  very  scarce, 
and  much  grumbling  was  heard  in  consequence.  How 
we  got  along,  I  don't  know ;  more  by  luck  than  man- 
agement, probably." 

Of  course,  in  such  a  dearth  of  the  necessaries  of  array 
life,  and  with  nothing  that  could  by  any  possibility  be 
termed  a  camp  chest,  the  men  were  obliged  to  serve 
without  paj'.  This  did  not  make  much  difference,  for 
they  did  not  expect  any,  and  consequently  they  were 
not  disappointed.  As  a  rule,  they  belonged  to  the  well- 
to-do  class,  were  above  the  avei-age  in  intelligence  and 
education ;  and  they  had  joined  the  guard  not  from 
any  expectation  of  pay,  but  from  an  honest  convic- 
tion that  the  State  had  been  wantonly  outraged  and 
it  was  their  duty  to  come  to  her  defense,  or  else  they 
had  been  led  thereto  by  the  determination  to  stand  by 
their  Southern  friends  and  relatives  in  their  effort  to 
resist  invasion.  The  question  of  slavery  was  lost  sight 
of  altogether,  and  Snead  was  probably  not  far  wrong 
when  he  said  that  among  them  all  there  was  not  a  man 
who  would  have  fired  a  shot  had  that  been  the  only 
issue  involved. 

Leaving  Price  to  go  on  with  the  work  of  organizing 
his  little  army,  Jackson,  on  the  12th  of  July,  left  for 
Memphis,  Tennessee,  in  order  to  induce  the  military 
authorities  to  send  a  body  of  Confederates  into  Missouri 
strong  enough  to  take  possession  of  the  State.     It  was 


SECOND  MEETING    OF  THE   CONVENTION.     319 

not  the  first  time  that  he  had  urged  such  a  policy,  for 
early  in  June,  before  Lyon's  declaration  of  war,  he  had 
sent  Cai)tain  Colton  Greene  to  McCulloch's  headquar- 
ters at  Fort  Smith,  requesting  him  to  move  into  Mis- 
souri with  his  army,  for  the  purpose  of  encouraging  the 
Southern  rights  people,  and  of  giving  Price  time  to  en- 
list and  organize  the  state  troops.  This  was  certainly  a 
singular  request  to  come  from  the  governor  of  a  State 
which  had  decided  against  secession,  though,  considered 
from  a  military  point  of  view,  there  can  be  no  doubt  as 
to  the  advisability  of  the  movement  he  suggested.  In 
fact,  so  favorably  was  it  regai'ded  that  McCullocli  ap- 
plied to  the  Confederate  War  Department  for  permission 
to  undertake  a  campaign  which  was  partly  based  upon 
it.  Before  he  could  get  an  answer,  it  became  necessary 
for  him  to  act,  and  it  was  therefore  upon  his  own  re- 
sponsibility that,  on  the  4th  of  July,  he  had  crossed  the 
border  and  advanced  to  the  support  of  Jackson,  who 
was  supposed  to  be  in  danger  of  being  caught  between 
Lyon  and  Sigel  and  so  destroyed. 

When,  at  length,  after  his  return  to  his  camp  in  the 
Indian  Nation,  an  answer  was  received  to  his  applica- 
tion, it  was  found  to  discourage  the  idea  of  a  forward 
movement  into  Missouri,  She  had  not,  it  was  said,  se- 
ceded ;  and  through  an  absurd  adherence,  at  this  most 
inopportune  moment,  to  the  doctrine  of  states'  rights,  the 
authorities  at  Richmond  let  slip  the  opportunity,  and 
failed  to  make  the  fight  for  Missouri  at  the  only  time 
when  they  could  have  done  so  with  any  prospect  of  suc- 
cess. To  McCulloch's  request  for  permission  to  occupy 
Fort  Scott,  and  thereby  overawe  southern  Kansas  and 
encourage  the  secessionists  in  that  part  of  Missouri,  they 
answered,  under  date  of  July  4th,  that  "  the  position  of 


320  MISSOURI. 

Missouri  as  a  Southern  State  still  in  the  Union  requires, 
as  you  will  readily  perceive,  much  prudence  and  cir- 
cumspection, and  it  should  only  be  when  necessity  and 
propriety  unite  that  active  and  direct  assistance  should 
be  afforded  by  crossing  the  boundary  and  entering  the 
State  before  communicating  with  this  department."  As 
Richmond  was  a  thousand  miles  from  McCuUoch's  head- 
quarters, and  telegraphic  communication  between  the 
two  points  was  not  continuous,  the  propriety  of  such  an 
order  may  well  be  questioned. 

Daring  the  time  that  Jackson  was  in  Memphis,  en- 
gaged in  what  proved  to  be  a  fruitless  undertaking, 
the  convention  which  had  been  called  together  by  the 
committee  apj)olnted  for  the  purpose  met  at  Jefferson 
City.  In  the  two  months  and  more  that  had  elapsed 
since  the  seizure  of  Camp  Jackson,  the  exasperation 
caused  by  that  act  had  measurably  subsided,  or  rather, 
it  had  given  place  to  a  tardy  recognition  of  the  fact  that 
the  two  sections  of  the  country  were  at  war  ;  and  that 
divested  of  extraneous  issues,  all  that  Missouri  now  had 
to  do  was  to  adopt  such  a  course  as  would  make  her- 
adherence  to  the  Union  effective.  This  simplification 
of  the  issue  had  necessitated  another  change  of  parties, 
and  men  who  but  a  few  months  before  had  ridiculed  the 
idea  of  a  Federal  invasion  of  the  South  were  now  ready 
to  buckle  on  their  swords  and  take  part  in  such  an  inva- 
sion. Indeed,  so  rapid  had  been  the  development  of  the 
Union  sentiment  that  on  the  30th  of  July,  the  convention 
went  to  the  extreme  length  of  deposing  Governor  Jack- 
son and  appointing  Hamilton  R.  Gamble  in  his  place. 
They  also  declared  vacant  the  seats  of  the  members  of 
the  General  Assembly,  and  they  formally  abrogated  the 
laws  which   had    been   passed   for  the  purpose,  it  was 


SECOND   MEETING   OF  THE   CONVENTION.      321 

charged,  of  enabling  the  governor  to  carry  on  a  war 
against  the  general  government. 

These  were  certainly  radical  measures,  but  they  were 
necessary  steps  in  the  revolution  then  in  progress  in  the 
State,  and  as  such  they  can  be  justified.  Jackson  was 
unquestionably  engaged  in  an  attempt  to  defeat,  by 
force,  the  will  of  the  people  as  expressed  at  the  Febru- 
ary election,  and  for  this  he  deserved  impeachment  and 
removal.  Under  the  circumstances,  however,  this  was 
impossible,  and  consequently  the  only  way  to  reach  him 
and  to  put  a  stop  to  his  intrigues  was  to  depose  him. 
This  could  only  be  done  by  a  successful  revolution,  and 
in  the  condition  of  affairs  which  then  prevailed,  it  was 
eminently  proper  that  the  convention  should  take  the 
lead  in  such  a  movement.  But  whilst  all  this  is  plain 
enough  to  require  no  argument,  it  must  be  confessed 
that  the  attempt  to  invest  the  proceeding  with  any  legal 
sanction  is  not  so  successful.  Certainly,  if  the  conven- 
tion had  the  right  to  pull  down  and  set  up  state  officers 
who  held  their  positions  by  the  same  title  as  that  by 
which  the  members  of  the  convention  held  theirs  ;  and 
if,  furthermore,  they  had  the  right,  during  three  years, 
to  arrogate  to  themselves  the  executive  and  legislative 
powers  of  the  State,  so  far  as  the  military  authorities 
permitted  them  to  do  so,  there  can  be  no  good  reason 
why  they  might  not  have  declared  themselves  a  close 
corporation,  with  power  to  govern  the  State  in  perpetu- 
ity, and  this  is  absurd. 

Moreover,  from  the  necessities  of  the  case,  the  com- 
mittee to  which  was  intrusted  the  task  of  defending  the 
action  of  the  convention  were  obliged  to  rest  their  ai'gu- 
ment  upon  facts  which,  if  carried  to  a  logical  conclu- 
sion, would  have  brought  the  State  into  armed  collision 


322  MISSOURI. 

with  the  federal  government  as  surely  as  they  had 
done  in  the  case  of  Governor  Jackson.  Without  going 
into  details,  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that  the  State  was  "in- 
vaded "  hy  troops  from  Iowa  and  Kansas  some  time  be- 
fore the  Confederates  crossed  the  boundary.  Regarded 
simjDly  as  "  outrages,"  the  one  invasion  was  as  bad  as 
the  other ;  and  if  "  the  duty  of  vindicating  the  sover- 
eignty of  the  State  "  required  the  convention,  in  the  one 
case,  to  depose  Governor  Jackson  for  inviting  the  Con- 
federates to  enter  the  State,  it  is  difficult  to  understand 
why  the  same  sense  of  duty  should  not,  in  the  other  in- 
stance, have  led  these  same  defenders  of  the  doctrine  of 
state  sovereignty  to  resent  the  continued  presence  of 
troops  who  had  come  into  the  State  without  an  invita- 
tion from  any  authoritative  quarter,  and  whose  illegal 
exactions  and  arbitrary  arrests  were  the  cause  of  the 
unsettled  condition  which  prevailed  in  portions  of  the 
State  otherwise  unquestionably  loyal. 

In  thus  calling  attention  to  the  inconsistency  and  ille- 
gality that  characterized  some  of  the  acts  of  the  con- 
vention, it  must  not  be  supposed  that  the  writer  under- 
rates the  iinportance  of  the  work  it  performed,  or  that 
he  wishes  to  detract  from  tlie  meed  of  praise  to  which 
it  is  so  justly  entitled.  Undoubtedly,  those  of  its  ordi- 
nances that  partook  of  a  legislative  character  were  il- 
legal and  revolutionary,  but  they  were  necessary  to  the 
life  of  the  State,  and  their  illegality  and  revolutionary 
nature  will  be  overlooked  in  view  of  this  fact,  and  be- 
cause it  was  only  by  usurping  legislative  and  executive 
powers  that  the  convention  was  able  to  preserve  the 
machinery  of  the  state  government  and  keep  it  in  mo- 
tion. When  Jackson  was  driven  into  exile,  the  State 
was  left  without  a  legal  official  head,  and  she  was  in 


SECOND   MEETING  OF   THE  CONVENTION.      323 

dangei-  of  drifting  into  anarchy  or  being  reduced  to  the 
condition  of  a  conquered  province  and  governed  by  an 
appointee  from  Washington.  In  this  emergency,  the 
convention  stepped  into  the  breach,  organized  a  provi- 
sional government,  and  thereby  saved  her  from  the 
thrtBatened  dangers.  It  Avas  a  practical  and  timely  as- 
sertion of  the  principle  of  self-government,  for  which  the 
convention  deserves  and  should  receive  the  thanks  of 
every  Missourian.  Unconsciously,  perhaps,  but  none 
the  less  surely,  it  had  removed  the  only  excuse  that 
could  be  found  for  keeping  the  State  in  a  condition  of 
military  subjection,  and  in  so  doing,  it  saved  her  from 
the  pit  of  political  degradation  into  which  the  States  in 
rebellion  were  sunk  during  the  period  of  reconstruction. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

SPRINGFIELD   AND    LEXINGTON  :     THE    CONFEDERATES 
EVACUATE    THE    STATE. 

For  two  weeks  and  more  after  the  occupation  of 
Boonville,  Lyon  was  unable  to  move  owing  to  the  want 
of  transportation.  Even  after  he  started,  he  was  still 
further  delayed  by  high  water  and  the  necessity  of  swerv- 
ing from  his  direct  route  in  order  to  effect  a  junction 
with  Major  Sturgis,  so  that  he  did  not  reach  Springfield 
until  the  13th  of  July.  Including  Sweeny's  command, 
he  found  himself,  upon  his  arrival  here,  at  the  head  of 
about  seven  thousand  men.  Of  this  number,  some  three 
thousand  had  enlisted  for  only  ninety  days,  and  as  their 
term  of  service  would  expire  on  or  before  the  middle  of 
August,  they  could  not  be  depended  upon  for  a  longer 
campaign.  They  were,  besides,  badly  clothed,  poorly 
fed,  and  imperfectly  supplied  with  tents ;  none  of  them 
had  been  jjaid,  and  the  tliree  months'  volunteers  are  said 
to  have  become  so  disheartened  that  very  few  of  them 
were  willing  to  reenlist.  In  view  of  these  facts  and  the 
rumored  approach  of  Jackson  with  "  not  less  than  thirty 
thousand  men,"  Lyon  telegraphed  St.  Louis,  immedi- 
ately on  his  arrival  at  Springfield  that  he  must  have 
an  additional  force  of  ten  thousand  men  or  abandon  the 
position. 

For  various  reasons  it  was  impossible  to  reinforce 
him.     In  fact  not  a  regiment  was  ordered  forward  until 


SPRINGFIELD  AND  LEXINGTON.  325 

the  4th  of  August,  too  late  to  be  of  any  service  ;  and 
though  General  Fremont,  who  took  command  of  the 
department  on  the  2oth  of  July,  has  been  severely  cen- 
sured for  the  delay,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how,  with  the 
other  interests  committed  to  his  charge,  he  could  have 
acted  differently.  The  battle  of  Bull  Run,  it  will  be 
remembered,  had  just  been  fought,  and  leaving  out  of 
consideration  the  necessity  which  was  then  supposed  to 
exist  of  hurrying  every  available  man  to  the  defense  of 
Washington,  it  will  be  sufficient  to  call  attention  to  the 
fact  that  upon  his  arrival  in  St.  Louis,  Fremont,  with  a 
limited  force  and  insufficient  means,  found  himself  con- 
fronted by  the  problem  of  defending  Cairo  and  the 
mouth  of  the  Ohio,  whilst  according  to  the  testimony  of 
Colonel  Chester  Harding,  Jr.,  Lyon's  adjutant-general, 
the  condition  of  Missouri  was  such  as  to  make  it  unsafe 
to  withdraw  any  troops  from  the  sections  of  the  State 
in  which  they  were  then  stationed.  Moreover,  Lyon's 
force  was  as  large  as  any  other  separate  command  in  the 
department ;  and  if  we  may  credit  the  statement  that 
Fremont,  when  told  that  Lyon  intended  to  fight  any- 
way, answered  that  "  he  must  do  it  upon  his  own  respon- 
sibility," it  would  appear  that  he  did  not  approve  of  the 
plan  of  risking  a  battle  when,  by  a  retreat  upon  Rolla, 
the  safety  of  the  command  might  be  insured.  Such  too 
was  evidently  the  opinion  of  Lyon's  subordinates,  and 
was  his  own,  though  he  afterwards  saw  fit  to  change  his 
mind  without,  however,  assigning  any  satisfactory  reason 
for  so  doing. 

In  the  mean  time,  whilst  Lyon  was  detained  here, 
waiting  for  the  reinforcements  which  it  was  impossible 
to  furnish,  the  Confederate  authorities  at  Memphis  re- 
solved upon  a  camj^aign  which  embraced  the  advance  of 


326  MISSOURI. 

a  strong  column  into  southeast  Missouri  for  the  pur- 
pose either  of  "  taking  him  in  the  rear  whilst  Price  and 
McCuUoch  attacked  him  in  front,  or  marching  upon  St. 
Louis,  capturing  that  city,  and  then  sweeping  up  the  Mis- 
souri." This  plan  would  have  been  feasible  enough  if 
the  Confederates  had  been  in  a  condition  to  invade  the 
southeastern  portion  of  the  State  in  force.  Unfortu- 
nately, however,  for  the  success  of  their  plans,  they  were 
obliged  to  convert  this  proposed  movement  into  a  feint ; 
and  although  it  was  successful  in  so  far  as  it  prevented 
Lyon  from  being  reinforced,  and  thus  obliged  him  to 
fight  a  losing  battle,  yet  it  deprived  Price,  in  the  advance 
which  he  subsequently  made  to  the  Missouri  River,  of 
the  advantage  which  would  have  accrued  to  him  from  a 
diversion,  such  as  the  march  of  a  heavy  column  upon  St. 
Louis  would  have  caused. 

Of  the  adoption  of  this  plan  and  of  its  abandonment, 
Price  and  McCulloch  were  duly  informed,  but  not  in 
time  to  affect  their  movements ;  and  being  thus  left  to 
fight  the  battle  at  their  end  of  the  line  according  to 
their  best  judgment,  they  prepared  to  march  upon  Lyon 
without  reference  to  the  movement  of  any  correspond- 
ing column.  On  the  25th  of  July,  Price  broke  camp 
on  Cowskin  Prairie  and  set  out  for  the  rendezvous  at 
Cassville,  a  small  town  situated  about  forty  miles  south- 
west of  Springfield.  There  he  arrived  on  the  28th.  The 
next  day  McCulloch  came  up  with  3,200  Confederates, 
and  following  close  behind  him  was  General  Pearce  with 
2,500  of  the  Arkansas  state  troops.  These  with  the 
5,000  armed  men  under  Price  swelled  the  entire  force 
available  for  the  march  on  Springfield  to  about  11,000, 
in  addition  to  which  there  were  2,000  unarmed  Missou- 
rians,  who  insisted  upon  following  the  army,  much  to 
McCulloch's  disEfust. 


SPRINGFIELD   AND   LEXINGTON.  327 

Informed  of  the  advance  of  these  different  commands 
and  thinking  to  strike  them  in  detail,  Lyon  moved  out 
from  Springfield  on  the  1st  of  August  at  the  head  of 
5,000  men.  The  next  day,  he  encountered  the  advance 
guard  of  the  Confederates,  consisting  of  a  part  of  Rains' 
brigade  of  Missouri  troops,  which  he  easily  put  to  flight. 
It  was  an  insignificant  affair,  of  no  material  benefit  to 
the  victors,  and  yet  it  is  said  to  have  caused  McCulloch 
to  lose  all  confidence  in  the  fighting  qualities  of  the 
Missourians.  On  the  morning  of  the  3d,  Lyon  ad- 
vanced still  further,  and  took  a  position  within  six 
miles  of  McCuUoch's  camp.  Here  he  remained  for 
twenty-four  hours,  when  fearing  lest  the  Confederates 
might  cut  off  his  communications,  he  fell  back  upon 
Springfield,  arriving  there  on  the  evening  of  Monday 
the  5th. 

Meanwhile  there  was  a  total  want  of  harmony  in  the 
councils  of  the  Confederates,  growing  out  of  the  fact 
that  Price  and  the  Missourians  were  determined  to  bring 
on  a  battle,  whilst  McCulloch  was  unwilling  to  assume 
the  offensive,  alleging  as  an  excuse  that  his  orders  did 
not  permit  him  to  move  into  Missouri  except  so  far  as 
it  might  be  necessary  for  the  defense  of  the  Indian 
territory  ;  and  that  to  advance  further  into  the  State 
might  endanger  that  territory  and  subject  him  to  cen- 
sure. This  was  a  valid  excuse,  though  there  is  reason 
to  believe  that  it  was  not  the  only  one.  It  is  in  evi- 
dence that  he  was  influenced  by  his  distrust  of  the  Mis- 
sourians, and  their  officers,  and  justly  enough,  he  hesi- 
tated about  risking  a  battle  so  long  as  the  army  was 
subject  to  a  divided  command.  Suspecting  the  cause  of 
his  unwillingness  to  move,  Price  waived  his  rank  and 
proposed  to  take  a  secondary  position,  though  he    re- 


328  MISSOURI. 

served  the  right  of  resuming  the  command  of  his  own 
troops  whenever  he  should  think  proper  to  do  so.  Be- 
ing now  at  the  head  of  both  armies,  and  having  been 
informed  of  the  entry  of  the  Confederates  into  south- 
east Missouri,  McCulloch  agreed  to  attack  Lyon  ;  and 
accordingly  he  marched  at  midnight  of  Sunday  the  4th, 
so  as  to  have  his  men  in  position  by  daybreak  the  next 
morning.  Soon  after  starting  he  learned  that  Lyon  had 
retreated  and  was  now  beyond  liis  reach,  but  he  did  not 
allow  this  to  check  his  advance.  He  still  pushed  on, 
and  that  night  he  camped  at  Moody's  Spring,  twelve 
miles  from  Springfield.  The  next  morning,  he  moved 
two  miles  further  and  took  a  position  on  Wilson's 
Creek,  near  some  fields  of  corn  then  in  the  "  roasting 
ear  "  stage,  as  ''  that  was  to  be  his  main  dependence  for 
food  during  the  next  few  days  "  and  until  his  trains 
could  arrive. 

Here  the  disputes  between  the  Confederate  command- 
ers were  renewed.  Price  still  urging  an  advance,  whilst 
McCulloch  was  determined  not  to  make  a  blind  attack, 
as  he  called  it,  upon  Spring-field.  According  to  his  own 
account  the  Missourians  failed  to  furnish  him  with  re- 
liable information  as  to  the  strength  and  position  of  the 
enemy  and  the  character  of  the  defenses  in  and  around 
Springfield,  as  he  expected  them  to  do,  though  "  to  urge 
them  he  declared  that  he  would  lead  the  whole  army 
back  to  Cassville  rather  than  bring  on  an  engagement 
with  an  unknown  enemy."  At  length  on  the  8th,  Price 
learned,  upon  what  he  considered  good  authority,  that 
Lyon  was  preparing  to  abandon  Springfield,  as  Peck- 
ham  says  he  intended  doing  up  to  the  day  before  the 
battle.  Communicating  this  information  to  McCul- 
loch, Price  insisted  so  strenuously  upon  an  advance  that 


SPRINGFIELD  AND  LEXINGTON.  329 

McCuUoch  agreed  to  call  a  council  of  war.  This  was 
held  at  noon  of  the  9tli,  and  after  a  stormy  scene  in 
which  Price  threatened  to  take  the  Missourians  and 
with  them  alone  give  battle  to  Lyon,  McCulloch  yielded, 
and  the  army  was  ordered  to  march  at  nine  o'clock  that 
evening.  Before  that  hour  it  began  to  rain,  and  as 
three  fourths  of  the  command  were  without  cartridge 
boxes,  and  would  consequently  have  found  it  difficult  to 
keep  their  powder  dry,  the  order  was  countermanded, 
though  the  men  rested  upon  their  arms  preparatory  to 
a  forward  movement  in  the  morning. 

Lyon  was  now  sorely  perjjlexed.  No  reinforcements 
had  reached  him,  and  if  we  may  judge  from  his  own 
dispatches  and  the  testimony  of  his  officers,  he  was  at 
a  loss  whether  to  retreat  or  to  hold  his  position  until 
driven  back.  He  was  even  undecided  whether,  in  case 
of  retreat,  he  should  fall  back  upon  Rolla,  Missouri,  or 
Fort  Scott,  Kansas.  At  last,  being  loth  to  give  up  the 
Southwest  he  decided  to  fight,  in  opposition,  as  his  biog- 
rapher tells  us,  to  the  opinion  of  his  council.  Having 
made  up  his  mind  to  this,  he  lost  no  time  in  carrying 
out  his  design.  On  the  morning  of  the  9th,  after  a  con- 
sultation with  Sigel,  he  adopted  the  hazardous  plan  of 
dividing  his  little  army  in  the  face  of  a  numerically  supe- 
rior force.  One  of  his  columns,  consisting  of  1,200  men 
under  Colonel  Sigel,  was  to  move  to  the  left  or  eastward 
of  the  Cassville  road  and  Wilson's "  Creek,  for  the  pur- 
pose of  turning  the  Confederate  right ;  whilst  he  him- 
self, with  4,200  men,  including  eight  companies  of  reg- 
ulars and  ten  pieces  of  artillery,  was  to  attack  the  ene- 
my's left,  on  the  west  side  of  the  creek.  Both  of  these 
movements  were  successful,  as  the  Confederate  pickets 
had  been  withdrawn  during  the  night ;  and  at  dawn  on 


330  MISSOURI. 

tlie  morning  of  the  10th,  the  Southern  army  lay  between 
Sigel  and  Lyon  and  in  blissful  ignorance  of  their  prox- 
imity. Almost  the  first  intimation  that  the  rebel  gen- 
erals had  of  the  presence  of  an  enemy  was  the  roar  of 
Lyon's  guns  as  he  came  into  position  on  the  west  side  of 
the  creek,  followed  immediately  by  the  boom  of  Sigel's 
cannon,  as  it  thundered  forth  a  quick  response  from  the 
other  end  of  the  line. 

Breaking  up  the  consultation  which,  early  as  it  was, 
they  were  holding,  McCulloch  hastened  to  the  east  side 
of  the  creek,  and  put  himself  at  the  head  of  the  troops 
that  subsequently  whipped  Sigel  and  drove  back  Plum- 
mer ;  whilst  Price,  having  ordered  the  Missourians  to 
follow  as  rapidly  as  possible,  hurried  to  the  front  where 
he  met  Cawthon's  brigade  which  was  falling  back  before 
Lyon,  though  still  ''  resisting  all  that  it  could."  By  the 
time  that  he  had  steadied  this  brigade,  and  formed  it 
anew  under  the  brow  of  Bloody  Hill  and  out  of  the 
range  of  Totten's  cannon,  the  Missourians  began  to  ar- 
rive on  the  field.  Li  less  than  half  an  hour,  3,100  of 
them,  including  Guibor's  battery  of  four  guns,  were  in 
position ;  and  soon  afterwards,  Churchill's  regiment, 
600  strong,  of  McCulloch's  brigade,  came  up  and  took 
its  place  in  the  line  of  battle. 

To  attack  this  force  Lyon  now  moved  with  about  1,900 
men,  the  rest  of  his  command,  except  four  companies  of 
regulars  under  Captain  Plummer,  being  held  in  reserve. 
At  this  time  the  two  armies  were  concealed  from  each 
other  by  the  dense  growth  of  underbrush  with  which 
the  hill  was  covered,  though  they  were  so  close  to  each 
other  that  the  order  to  advance  was  distinctly  heard 
within  the  Confederate  lines.  Holding  their  fire  until 
the  Union  troops  had  come  within  easy  range.  Price's 


SPRINGFIELD  AND  LEXINGTON.  331 

men  opened  upon  them  with  shotguns  and  rifles,  "  while 
from  opposing  heights,  Totten,  who  had  but  lately  been 
stationed  at  Little  Rock,  where  his  family  still  resided, 
fought  furiously  against  Woodruff's  batteiy,  which  now 
turned  against  him  the  very  guns  that  had  been  taken 
from  him  a  few  months  before. 

"  The  battle  thus  joined  upon  the  hillside  was  waged 
for  hours  with  intense  earnestness.  The  lines  would  ap- 
proach again  and  again  within  less  than  fifty  yards  of 
each  other,  and  then,  after  delivering  a  deadly  fire,  each 
would  fall  back  a  few  paces  to  reform  and  reload,  only 
to  advance  again,  and  again  renew  this  strange  battle  in 
the  woods.  Peculiar  in  all  its  aspects  .  .  •  the  most  re- 
markable of  all  its  characteristics  was  the  deep  silence 
which  now  and  then  fell  upon  the  smoking  field  .  .  . 
while  the  two  armies,  unseen  of  each  other,  lay  but  a  few 
yards  apart,  gathering  strength  to  grapple  again  in  the 
death  struggle  for  Missouri."  ^ 

By  ten  o'clock  the  Confederate  regiments  that  were 
on  tbe  east  side  of  the  creek,  having  defeated  Sigel 
and  driven  back  Plummer  and  his  regulars,  began  to 
cross  over  and  hasten  to  the  assistance  of  Price.  Seeing 
the  approach  of  these  fresh  troops,  some  of  whom  had 
not  been  under  fire,  Lyon  at  once  ordered  forward  every 
available  battalion.  "  The  engagement,"  so  the  Federal 
reports  tell  us,  "  now  became  general,  and  almost  incon- 
ceivably fierce  along  the  entire  line,  the  enemy  appear- 
ing in  front  often  in  three  or  four  ranks,  lying  down, 
kneeling,  and  standing,  the  lines  often  approaching 
within  thirty  or  forty  yards  of  each  other  as  the  enemy 
would  charge  upon  Captain  Totten's  battery  and  be 
driven  back."  For  an  hour  and  more  this  bloody  work 
1   The  Fight  for  Missouri,  p.  2T5. 


332  MISSOURI. 

continued,  and  it  was  at  this  stage  of  the  battle  that  Lyon, 
while  leading  a  charge,  was  killed.  Soon  after  his  fall, 
there  came  a  lull  in  the  fight,  during  which  Sturgis,  who 
succeeded  to  the  command,  summoned  the  principal  offi- 
cers to  a  consultation.  The  question,  we  are  told,  with 
most  of  them  was  whether  retreat  was  possible,  and  so 
doubtful  did  it  then  appear,  that  even  while  the  discus- 
sion was  going  on,  the  Federals  were  called  upon  to  re- 
sist an  attack  in  which  the  Confederates  charged  within 
twenty  feet  of  Totten's  guns.  Fortunately  for  the  cause 
of  the  Union,  the  attack  was  repulsed,  and  before  it  was 
renewed,  the  Federals,  unable  to  hold  their  ground  against 
the  increasing  force  of  the  enemy,  abandoned  the  field 
and  began  a  retreat  which  only  ended  at  Rolla. 

This  closed  the  battle.  It  had  lasted  about  six  hours, 
and  considering  the  number  of  men  engaged,  and  the 
fact  that  but  few  of  them  had  ever  been  under  fire,  and 
that  a  large  proportion  of  them  were  armed  with  noth- 
ing but  shotguns  and  hunting  rifles,  it  was  one  of  the 
bloodiest,  as  it  was  one  of  the  most  memorable,  conflicts 
of  modern  times  ;  of  the  5,400  Union  men  that  took  part 
in  the  fight  over  1,000  were  killed  or  wounded,  whilst 
of  the  10,000  Confederates  that  were  actually  engaged 
over  1,200  suffered.  If  to  these  numbers  we  add  the 
186  Federals,  chiefly  of  Sigel's  command,  that  were 
missing,  it  will  give  a  total  of  2,547  killed,  wounded, 
and  missing,  out  of  '15,000  actual  combatants,  or  about 
sixteen  per  cent.  But  if  we  limit  ourselves  to  the  con- 
test on  Bloody  Hill,  which  was  to  all  intents  a  separate 
battle,  it  will  be  found  that  of  the  3,500  Federals  and 
4,200  Confederates  that  were  there  pitted  against  each 
other,  the  former  lost  892  and  the  latter  988  men  ;  or 
taking  both  together  it  will  be  seen  that  of  the  7,700 


SPRINGFIELD  AND  LEXINGTON.  333 

men  engaged,  1,880,  or  about  twenty-five  pei*  cent.,  were 
killed  or  wounded,  and  this,  be  it  remembered,  among 
troojjs  but  few  of  whom  had  ever  fired  a  shot  in  anger, 
and  almost  one  half  of  whom  were  insufficiently  armed. 
Of  the  Confederates  who  fought  on  Bloody  Hill,  3,100 
were  Missourians  and  1,100  Arkansians,  and  their  re- 
sjiective  losses  were  680  and  308.  On  the  side  of  the 
Federals,  the  first  Missouri,  Blair's  regiment,  and  Oster- 
haus'  battalion  bore  themselves  with  equal  gallantry. 
Out  of  925  men  belonging  to  these  two  commands,  91 
were  killed,  248  wounded,  and  11  missing,  making  a 
total  of  350,  or  about  thirty-seven  jjer  cent.  The  Iowa 
and  Kansas  troops,  too,  fought  equally  well  ;  but  of  the 
German  regiments  under  Sigel,  the  same  cannot  be  said. 
When  brigaded  with  other  troops  the  Germans  made 
fairly  good  soldiers,  but  left  to  themselves  they  were 
never  able  to  stand  before  an  equal  number  of  Confed- 
erates, and  in  this  case  they  were  expected  to  attack  a 
superior  force. 

As  soon  as  it  was  known  that  the  Federals  were 
leaving  the  field,  McCuUoch  was  urged  to  pursue  them 
vigorously,  but  this  he  refused  to  do,  as  many  of  his  men 
had  fired  their  last  cartridge  in  the  battle,  and  were  con- 
sequently without  ammunition.  That  night,  the  Federal 
troops  evacuated  Springfield,  and  on  the  17th  they  ar- 
rived at  Rolla,  a  somewhat  disorganized  mass  of  fugi- 
tives, but  with  their  large  and  valuable  train  of  three 
hundred  and  seventy  wagons  safe. 

A  few  days  after  the  battle,  General  Price  called  on 
McCuUoch  and  proposed  to  him  to  cooperate  in  a  march 
to  the  Missouri  River.  This  McCuUoch  declined,  alleg- 
ing first  his  orders,  which  made  the  defense  of  the  Indian 
Nation  his  primary  consideration ;  secondly,  the  scarcity 


384  MISSOURI. 

of  ammunition ;  and  thirdly,  the  fact  that  the  force  in- 
tended for  the  invasion  of  southeast  Missouri  had  been 
obliged  to  fall  back,  and  consequently  he  could  not 
reckon  upon  a  diversion  in  that  quarter.  To  a  Confed- 
erate officer,  as  McCuUoch  was,  the  first  of  these  reasons 
was,  of  course,  sufficient ;  and  accordingly  he  led  his 
brigade  back  to  their  camp  in  the  Indian  country,  whilst 
the  Arkansas  State  troops,  under  General  Pearce,  re- 
turned homeward.  Price,  however,  was  not  to  be  de- 
terred from  his  expedition  to  the  Missouri,  and  on  the 
25th  of  August  he  set  out  from  Springfield  on  the  cam- 
paign which  resulted  in  the  capture  of  Lexington. 

Proceeding  northward  as  far  as  Bolivar,  Polk  County, 
he  turned  sharply  to  the  west,  for  the  purpose,  as  he  tells 
us,  of  "  chastising  "  Senator  General  James  H.  Lane  and 
his  brigade  of  freebooters,  who  had  already  begun  that 
career  of  robbery,  arson,  and  murder,  which  converted 
Lawrence,  Kansas,  into  a  mere  fence-house  for  stolen 
property,  and  led,  in  August,  1863,  to  the  sack  of  that 
town,  and  the  massacre  of  183  of  its  inhabitants  by 
Quantrell's  band  of  guerrillas. 

Having  driven  Lane  and  his  doughty  warriors  out  of 
the  State  and  away  from  Fort  Scott,  and  thus  secured  his 
flank  from  attack.  Price  continued  his  march  northward, 
and  on  the  13th  of  September,  he  sat  down  before  Lex- 
ington with  his  advance  guard  of  mounted  men.  By  the 
18th,  his  ammunition  wagons  and  the  rest  of  his  forces 
arrived,  and  he  then  began  the  attack  on  the  place  in 
earnest.  After  fifty-two  hours  of  firing  it  was  surren- 
dered, the  garrison  having  been  cut  off  from  their  supply 
of  water.  The  loss  on  either  side  was  trifling,  owing  to 
the  fact  that  the  Union  troops  were  entrenched,  whilst 
the  Confederates  made  movable  breastworks  of   bales 


SPRINGFIELD  AND  LEXINGTON.  335 

of  hemp,  under  shelter  of  which  they  apiiroachecl  the 
enemy's  Avorks  with  comparative  impunity. 

According-  to  General  Price,  the  fruits  of  this  almost 
Woodless  victory  consisted  of  3,500  prisoners,  5  pieces  of 
artillery,  over  3,000  stand  of  arms,  750  horses,  about 
$100,000  worth  of  commissary  stores  and  a  large  amount 
of  other  property.  He  also  obtained  the  restoration  of 
$900,000  in  money  which  had  been  taken  from  the  bank, 
and  he  recovered  the  great  seal  of  the  State  and  the  pub- 
lic records,  which  are  said  to  have  been  stolen  from  their 
proper  custodian. 

During  the  two  weeks  and  more  that  Price  was  at 
Lexington,  his  force  was  considei'ably  augmented  by  re- 
cruits, many  of  whom  were  from  the  north  side  of  the 
river,  though  the  increase  was  nothing  like  as  great  as 
was  reported.  Instead  of  60,000,  there  were  probably 
never  more  than  from  15,000  to  18,000  men  in  and  about 
his  camp,  including  hundreds  who  had  come  to  see  the 
fight,  just  as  they  would  have  gone  to  a  country  fair. 
Of  this  number,  11,000  may  have  started  with  him  when 
he  began  his  retreat ;  but  so  numerous  were  the  deser- 
tions during  the  next  ten  days,  that  it  is  doubtful  whether, 
at  any  time  after  crossing  the  Osage,  he  could  have  mus- 
tered 7,000  men  for  duty.  As  this  force  was  never  ma- 
terially increased,  there  is  no  reason  to  Ijelieve  that  dur- 
ing the  3'ear  and  more  that  the  Missouri  state  guard 
was  in  existence,  it  was  ever  stronger  than  at  Wilson's 
Creek ;  and  there,  as  we  have  seen,  it  numbered  7,000 
men,  2,000  of  whom  were  unamned.  After  crossing  the 
Osage,  Price,  no  longer  in  fear  of  pursuit,  moved  leisurely 
southward  and  took  up  a  position  in  the  southwestern 
portion  of  the  State,  where  he  was  in  easy  communication 
with  McCuUoch,  and  could,  at  the  same  time,  protect  the 


336  MISSOURI. 

General  Assembly  which  had  been  summoned  by  Gov- 
ernor Jackson  to  meet  in  extra  session  at  Neosho,  on 
the  21st  of  October. 

Of  the  proceedings  of  this  body  it  is  unnecessary  to 
speak  in  detail.  It  was  a  mere  rump,  —  not  a  quorum  of 
either  house  being  present,  —  and  consequently  its  acts 
were  irregular  and  of  no  legal  force.  Moreover,  it  had 
relinquished  the  power  of  legislating  upon  the  subject  of 
secession  to  the  convention,  which  was  still  in  session, 
though  this  fact  was  conveniently  ignored,  and  an  act  was 
passed  which  purported  to  dissolve  the  ties  existing  be- 
tween the  State  of  Missouri  and  the  United  States  of 
America.  For  pm-poses  of  its  own,  the  Confederate 
government  saw  proper  to  regard  this  action  as  valid, 
and  on  the  28th  of  November  Missouri  was  formally  ad- 
mitted into  the  Confederacy,  though  it  was  now  too  late 
to  make  the  fight  for  her  with  any  prospect  of  success. 
In  fact,  it  was  whilst  the  few  members,  present  at  this 
meeting  of  the  General  Assembly,  were  playing  at  legis- 
lation that  Fremont,  whose  pursuit  of  Price  had  been 
delayed  by  the  want  of  transportation,  arrived  at  Spring- 
field with  a  well-appointed  army  of  forty  thousand  men. 
His  purpose,  so  it  was  stated,  was  to  force  the  Confeder- 
ates to  a  battle,  and  in  case  of  success,  of  which  he  had 
no  doubt,  he  then  proposed  to  sweep  down  upon  Little 
Rock,  Memphis,  and  ultimately  New  Orleans.  Unable 
to  stand  before  this  overwhelming  force,  McCulloch  was 
preparing  for  a  retreat  into  Arkansas,  when  on  the  2d 
of  November  Fremont  was  relieved  from  the  command 
of  the  army  which  he  may  be  said  to  have  created.  A 
few  days  afterwards,  in  obedience  to  a  suggestion  from 
President  Lincoln,  General  Hunter,  who  had  succeeded 
to  the  command,  fell  back  upon  Rolla  and  Sedalia. 


SPRINGFIELD  AND   LEXINGTON.  337 

Of  course  this  retrograde  movement  again  uncovered 
the  entire  Southwest,  and  Price  and  his  half-clothed  and 
half-fed  Missourians  were  not  slow  to  avail  themselves 
of  the  opportunity  of  returning.  For  a  few  months, 
now,  they  lived  at  their  ease.  Their  quarters  were  com- 
fortal)le,  forage  was  abundant,  their  food  was  plentiful 
and  of  the  best,  and  money,  such  as  it  was  —  state 
'•  scrip  "  and  Confederate  notes  —  circulated  freely  and 
apparently  without  any  fears  as  to  its  future  value.  A 
Confederate  veteran,  to  whose  account  of  the  state  guard 
I  have  repeatedly  had  occasion  to  refer,  teUs  us  that 
often  during  the  years  1863-64,  when  on  duty  in  South 
Carolina,  and  living  on  rice,  molasses,  and  sweet  potatoes, 
''which  were  served  with  commendable  regularity  twenty- 
one  times  per  week,"  his  mind  would  revert  to  the  "  flush 
times  "  at  Springfield,  and  he  would  long  for  the  scraps 
that  then  fell  from  his  table. 

These  halcyon  days  were  not  to  last.  On  the  13th 
of  February,  General  Curtis,  with  twelve  thousand  men, 
was  so  near  Springfield  that  Price,  who  had  delayed 
evacuating  the  place  in  the  hojw  that  INIcCuUoch  would 
come  to  his  assistance  and  enable  him  to  risk  a  battle, 
was  obliged  to  beat  a  hurried  retreat  into  Arkansas. 
Shortly  after  passing  the  state  line,  the  Confederates 
were  met  coming  to  the  rescue  ;  and  the  meeting  was 
made  memorable  by  the  fact  that  the  3d  Louisiana  had  a 
Confederate  battle-flag,  the  first  that  the  Missouri  troops 
had  seen.  Although  the  combined  force  of  Price  and 
McCulloch  was  fully  as  numerous  as  that  which  was 
pursuing  them,  yet  they  continued  to  fall  back  until  they 
reached  Cove  Creek,  in  the  Boston  Mountains,  twenty 
miles  beyond  Fayetteville.  Here  they  halted,  and  here 
they  were  on  the  2d  of  March  when  Van  Dorn  arrived 
and  took  the  command. 


338  MISSOURI. 

Including  Pike's  brigade  of  Indians  and  half-breeds, 
the  Confederates  now  numbered  about  fourteen  thousand 
available  men,  and  with  this  force  Van  Dorn  turned  on 
Curtis,  who  occupied  a  fortified  position  on  Pea  Ridge, 
near  the  Elkhorn  tavern,  with  ten  thousand  five  hundred 
men.  After  a  conflict  which  lasted  through  portions  of 
the  6th,  7th,  and  8th  of  the  month,  the  Confederate  at- 
tack was  repulsed  and  the  Union  army  was  left  in  pos- 
session of  the  field.  In  this  contest  the  Missourians,  in- 
cluding those  who  had  entered  the  Confederate  service 
as  well  as  the  state  guard,  numbered  about  six  thousand 
eight  hundred  men,  six  thousand  of  whom  were  actively 
engaged.  They  formed  the  left  wing  of  the  army,  and 
are  said  to  have  borne  the  brunt  of  the  battle.  From 
the  first  shot  to  the  last,  according  to  Van  Dorn's  offi- 
cial report,  "  they  continually  pushed  on,  never  yielded 
an  inch  they  had  won,  and  when  at  last  they  received 
the  order  to  fall  back  "  —  an  order  made  necessary  by 
the  deaths  of  McCulloch  and  Mcintosh,  the  capture  of 
Hubert,  and  the  defeat  of  the  Confederate  right  wing  — 
"  they  retired  steadily  and  with  cheers,"  thinking  it  only 
a  change  of  position. 

After  some  two  weeks  given  to  rest  and  reorganiza- 
tion. Van  Dorn  moved  with  the  Missourians  and  a 
large  part  of  his  other  troops  to  Des  Arc,  a  town  on 
White  River  in  the  eastern  portion  of  the  State,  where 
he  arrived  on  the  7th  of  April.  The  next  day,  General 
Price  published  an  order,  in  which  he  bade  farewell  to 
the  state  guard.  Shortly  after,  he  was  transferred  to 
the  other  side  of  the  Mississippi,  with  about  five  thou- 
sand of  the  Missouri  troops,  who  had  followed  him 
into  the  Confederate  service.  On  their  arrival  at  Beau- 
regard's  headquarters   near  Corinth,   Mississippi,   they 


CONFEDERATES  EVACUATE    THE  STATE.      339 

were  joined  by  a  number  of  their  fellow-citizens,  and 
together  they  organized  the  famous  1st  and  2d  Missoui'i 
Confederate  brigades.  Including  the  six  batteries  that 
had  crossed  the  river  with  them,  and  allowing  to  each 
regiment  and  battery  its  full  complement,  they  may 
have  numbered  ten  thousand  men.  This  is  an  outside 
estimate  ;  and  as  these  brigades  were  never  in  a  position 
to  increase  their  strength,  it  is  not  probable  that  the 
Missouri  Confederates,  serving  on  the  east  side  of  the 
Mississippi,  ever  exceeded  the  number  here  given.  Of 
the  subsequent  career  of  this  gallant  band  it  is  not  my 
province  to  speak,  though  the  story  of  their  courage, 
their  endurance,  and  their  devotion  to  the  cause  of  the 
South  has  been  well  told,  and  the  record  is  one  of  which 
every  Missourian  may  feel  proud.  Let  it  suffice  to  say 
that  on  the  5th  of  July,  1861,  they  had  fought  their 
first  battle  at  Carthage,  Missouri,  and  on  the  9th  of  April, 
1865,  the  very  day  on  which  Lee  sui-rendered,  these 
brigades,  now  consolidated  and  reduced  to  a  mere  skele- 
ton scarcely  four  hundred  strong,  fired  their  last  gun  at 
Fort  Blakeley  on  the  shores  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico. 

With  the  admission  of  Missouri  into  the  Confederacy 
and  the  transfer  of  so  many  of  her  troops  to  that  service, 
the  organization  of  the  state  guard  virtually  came  to  an 
end.  Thereafter,  the  Missourians  who  "'  went  South  "  and 
entered  the  Confederate  army,  were  known  as  Confeder- 
ates not  as  state  troops,  and  to  this  extent  lost  their 
individuality,  though  in  their  regimental  and  brigade 
organizations  they  were  still  credited  to  the  State.  Of  the 
number  who,  during  the  next  three  years,  left  their 
homes  and  in  the  face  of  grave  dangers  made  their  way 
to  the  Confederate  army,  it  is  impossible  to  speak  with 
certainty.     According  to  an  estimate  furnished  by  Gen- 


340  MISSOURI. 

eral  James  Harding,  they  did  not  exceed  six  regiments 
of  infantry,  ten  of  cavalry,  and  eight  batteries.  Allow- 
ing to  each  regiment  its  full  complement  of  one  thou- 
sand men,  and  to  each  battery  one  hundred,  it  would 
give  sixteen  thousand  eight  hundred  as  the  total  num- 
ber of  Missourians  on  the  west  side  of  the  river  ;  or, 
making  every  allowance  for  subsequent  increase  by  re- 
cruiting, they  may  have  amounted  to  twenty  thousand. 
This  is  a  liberal  estimate,  and  if  we  add  to  it  the  ten 
thousand  that  were  east  of  the  river,  it  will  swell  the 
grand  total  to  thii'ty  thousand,  and  this,  it  is  believed, 
will  cover  all  the  men  that  Missouri  contributed  to  the 
Confederate  service. 

Contrasted  with  the  magnificent  array  of  one  hun- 
dred and  nine  thousand  men,  including  eight  thousand 
colored  troops,  whom  she  sent  into  the  Union  army,  the 
Southern  contingent  is  small ;  but  if  we  consider  it  with 
reference  to  the  Breckinridge  vote  in  the  autumn  of 
1860,  or  if  we  compare  it  with  the  secession  vote  for 
members  of  the  convention  in  February,  1861,  it  will  be 
found  to  amount,  pi'actically,  to  a  levy  en  masse.  More- 
over, it  was  composed  of  the  best  material  in  the  State, 
consisting  in  good  part  of  men  who  served  vdthout  other 
hope  of  reward  than  that  which  comes  from  the  con- 
scientious discharge  of  a  duty,  and  of  others,  and  they 
were  not  a  few,  who  were  driven  into  the  rebel  ranks 
by  outrages  perpetrated  upon  them  by  the  military  au- 
thorities. Under  the  lead  of  Price,  Marmaduke,  and 
Shelby,  these  men  were  always  ready  for  a  raid  into 
the  State,  and  though  they  were  never  able  to  reestablish 
themselves  upon  her  soil,  yet  such  was  their  activity 
that  they  succeeded  in  keeping  much  of  the  region  south 
of  the  Missouri  in  a  constant  state  of  turmoil  and  ex- 


CONFEDERATES  EVACUATE    THE  STATE.      341 

citement.  In  the  end  they  shared  the  fate  of  the  Con- 
federacy, and  of  the  army  of  which  they  formed  a  part. 
Step  by  step  they  were  driven  back,  vintil,  at  the  close 
of  the  rebellion,  they  were  massed  upon  the  line  of  Red 
River,  and  not  in  the  Ozark  Mountains  and  upon  the 
Arkansas. 


CHAPTER   XVI. 

FROM   THE   EVACUATION   OF   THE   STATE   TO   THE   END 
OF    THE    WAR. 

Although  the  Confederates  were  never  able  to  recover 
the  ground  which  they  lost  in  the  early  part  of  1862, 
when  they  were  driven  from  Springfield  and  forced  to 
evacuate  New  Madrid,  it  would  be  a  mistake  to  suppose 
that  the  advance  of  the  Federals  and  the  military  rule 
which  they  established  were  followed  by  a  restoration  of 
peace  and  order.  So  far  were  they  from  it,  that,  prob- 
ably, but  few  months  elapsed  during  the  four  years  that 
the  war  lasted,  in  which  there  was  not  an  outbreak  of 
some  sort  in  some  part  of  the  State.  According  to  the 
official  records,  between  the  20th  of  Api'il,  1861,  the 
date  of  the  capture  of  the  Federal  arsenal  at  Liberty, 
Missouri,  and  the  20th  of  November,  1862,  —  a  period 
of  nineteen  months,  —  over  three  hundred  battles  and 
skirmishes  were  fought  within  the  limits  of  the  State.  Of 
the  number  that  took  place  during  the  last  two  years  of 
the  war  it  is  not  possible  to  speak  with  accuracy,  but  it 
is  probable  that  there  were  half  as  many  more  ;  and  it 
may  be  said  of  them  that  they  were  relatively  more  de- 
structive of  life,  as  by  this  time  the  contest  had  degen- 
erated into  a  disgraceful  internecine  struggle.  In  many, 
perhaps  a  large  majority,  of  these  skirmishes,  especially 
those  that  occurred  in  the  northern  half  of  the  State,  the 
combatants  on  the  side  of  the  Confederates  were  regu- 


THE  END   OF  THE   WAR.  343 

larly  enlisted  soldiers,  who  were  endeavoring  to  make 
their  way  south.  Theoretically,  this  ought  to  have  been 
iinjiossible,  for  all  this  region  was  within  the  Federal 
lines,  but  practically  there  never  was  a  time  when,  in 
spite  of  martial  law  and  the  formidable  barrier  which 
the  Missouri  offered  to  those  going  south,  a  rebel  re- 
cruiting officer  could  not  have  been  found  on  the  north 
side  of  the  river  by  any  one  who  was  anxious  to  do  so. 
In  the  last  great  raid  into  the  State,  the  one  led  by  Price 
in  i)erson  in  the  autumn  of  1864,  he  is  said  to  have 
been  joined  by  over  five  thousand  recruits. 

Fact^  like  these  indicate  a  deep-seated  spirit  of  dis- 
content ;  and  to  account  for  it  we  shall  have  to  trust  to 
other  influences  than  those  that  sprung  from  sympathy 
with  the  people  of  the  South  and  the  cause  for  which  they 
fought.  Unquestionably  this  sympathy,  founded  upon 
political  considerations  and  strengthened  by  ties  of  blood, 
was  chiefly  instrumental  in  sending  into  the  Southern 
army  the  men  who  followed  Price  and  Jackson  at  the 
outset  of  the  war.  It  will  not,  however,  explain  the  out- 
break which  took  place  in  the  summer  of  18C2,  nor  will 
it  account  for  the  fact  that  as  late  as  the  autumn  of 
1864,  Missouri,  though  still  overwhelmingly  true  to  the 
Union,  was  in  as  unsettled  a  condition  as  she  had  been 
at  any  time  since  the  capture  of  Camp  Jackson. 

Probably,  the  one  measure  which,  more  than  all 
others,  contributed  to  the  above-mentioned  outbreak, 
was  the  order  of  Governor  Gamble  enrolling  the  entire 
fighting  2)opulation  of  the  State,  and  authorizing  Gen- 
eral Schofield  to  call  such  portion  of  it  into  active  ser- 
vice as  might  be  deemed  necessary  to  put  down  all 
marauders  and  preserve  the  peace.  The  order  was 
somewhat  indefinite ;    it  was  generally  supposed   to    be 


344  MISSOURI. 

preliminary  to  a  draft,  and  it  was  looked  upon  by  the 
Southern  symjiathizers  as  betraying  an  intention  on  the 
part  of  the  state  and  federal  authorities  to  force  them 
into  the  army  and  make  them  fight  against  their  friends 
and  relatives  in  the  South.  They  also  regarded  it  as  a 
violation  by  the  State  of  the  implied  bargain  which  had 
been  entered  into  when  they  were  disarmed  and  obliged, 
under  penalty  of  arrest  and  imprisonment,  to  take  an 
oath  not  to  bear  arms  against  the  United  States  or  the 
provisional  government  of  Missouri,  and  to  give  a  bond 
for  the  faithful  observance  of  the  oath.  They  held,  and 
with  some  measure  of  justice,  that  in  exacting  this  bond, 
as  had  been  generally  done  throughout  the  State,  the 
government  had  recognized  them  as  non-combatants  ; 
and  they  resolved  that  if  they  must  take  a  part  in  the 
war,  they  would  choose  the  side  upon  which  they  were 
to  fight.  Hence,  as  General  Schotield  admits,  the  first 
effect  of  this  measure  was  to  cause  every  rebel  who  could 
possess  himself  of  a  weapon  to  spring  to  arms,  "  whilst 
thousands  of  others  ran  to  the  brush  to  avoid  the  required 
enrollment." 

Another  measure  of  more  or  less  influence  in  mould- 
ing public  opinion  was  the  Emancipation  Proclamation 
of  January  1,  1863 ;  not  that  it  applied  directly  to  Mis- 
souri, or  that  it  can  be  said  to  have  weakened  the  Union 
sentiment  among  the  great  mass  of  the  people,  but  for  the 
reason  that  it  gave  rise  to  serious  differences  among  the 
Union  men,  and,  in  the  opinion  of  not  a  few,  it  removed 
the  contest  from  the  high  plane  upon  which  it  had  hith- 
erto been  conducted,  and  reduced  it  to  the  level  of  mere 
party  politics.  To  understand  this,  it  is  necessary  to 
bear  in  mind  that  the  proclamation,  or  rather  the  over- 
throw of  slavery  which  it  brought  about,  was  in  direct 


THE   EXD   OF  THE    WAR.  345 

violation  of  the  assurances  upon  which  the  federal  gov- 
ernment had  thus  far  carried  on  the  contest ;  and  whilst 
as  a  war  measure  it  was  clearly  justifiable,  it  was  looked 
upon  as  introducing  new  and  different  issues  into  the 
struggle,  and  as  involving  the  exercise  of  a  power  for 
which  there  was  no  warrant  in  the  Constitution.  From 
this  point  of  view  it  was  open  to  criticism,  and  that  it 
w^as  so  considered  by  President  Lincoln  himself  is  evi- 
dent from  the  answer  he  returned  to  a  delegation  of 
Missouri  radicals  who  visited  Washington  for  the  pur- 
pose, among  others,  of  insisting  upon  the  immediate 
abolition  of  slavery  in  the  State,  in  preference  to  the 
scheme  of  gi*adual  emancipation  which  the  convention 
had  recently  adopted.  Speaking  of  the  political  situa- 
tion in  JMissouri  at  this  time,  Lincoln  said  that  it  was  a 
"  perplexing  compound  "  of  Union  and  slavery,  "  even 
among  those  who  were  for  the  Union,  to  say  nothing  of 
those  who  were  against  it."  Thus  there  were  "  those 
who  were  for  the  Union  with  but  not  without  slavery  ; 
those  for  it  withoxit  but  not  with;  those  for  it  icith  or 
without,  but  prefer  it  tvitli ;  and  those  who  are  for  it 
with  or  ivitlwut,  but  prefer  it  without.  Among  these, 
again,  is  a  subdivision  of  those  who  are  for  gradual  but 
not  for  immediate,  and  those  who  are  for  immediate  but 
not  for  gradual,  extinction  of  slavery."  These  different 
opinions,  he  continued,  might  be  honestly  entertained 
by  loyal  men,  and  this  would,  of  course,  give  rise  to  dif- 
ferent ideas  as  to  the  proper  w^ay  of  sustaining  the 
Union.  For  this  reason,  then,  he  declined  to  accede  to 
the  changes  upon  which  the  ladical  delegation  thought 
proper  to  insist,  and  in  so  doing  he  preserved  to  the 
people  of  the  State  the  small  remnant  of  self-govern- 
ment which  had  been  left   them.     In   concluding   his 


346  MISSOURI. 

answer,  and  apparently  by  way  of  emphasizing  his  posi- 
tion, he  says  in  his  terse  and  pointed  way  :  "  The  radi- 
cals and  conservatives  each  agree  with  me  In  some 
things  and  disagree  In  others.  I  could  wish  both  to 
agree  with  me  in  all  things  ;  for  then  they  would  agree 
with  each  other,  and  would  be  too  strong  for  any  foe 
from  any  quarter.  They,  however,  choose  to  do  other- 
wise, and  I  do  not  question  their  right.  I,  too,  shall  do 
what  seems  to  be  my  duty.  I  hold  whoever  commands 
In  Missouri  or  elsewhere  responsible  to  me,  and  not  to 
either  radicals  or  conservatives." 

Potent  as  this  measure  may  have  been  in  separating 
men  of  conservative  views  from  sympathy  mth  the  na- 
tional administration,  its  Influence  was  but  slight  when 
compared  with  that  exerted  by  the  constant  interfer- 
ence of  the  military  with  unoffending  citizens,  especially 
with  those  who  were  suspected  of  rebel  tendencies.  To 
enumerate  all  the  different  shapes  which  this  interfer- 
ence took  were  an  Idle  task.  Even  after  leaving  out 
those  cases  that  affected  the  entire  community,  and  con- 
fining ourselves  to  those  that  Involved  crimes  against  a 
class  or  against  Individuals,  they  will  be  found  to  run 
through  the  entire  gamut,  —  ranging  from  the  arbitrary 
arrest  and  imprisonment  of  men  and  women  for  mere 
opinion's  sake,  to  the  murder  of  prisoners  ;  from  the 
illegal  requisition  for  unnecessary  supplies  by  Irrespon- 
sible parties,  to  robbery,  pillage,  and  arson. 

To  a  great  extent  tliese  lawless  proceedings  were  In 
violation  of  orders,  and  It  would  therefore  be  unjust  to 
hold  the  department  commanders  or  the  administration 
at  Washington  responsible  for  them.  They  were  the 
acts  of  subordinates,  and  it  is  but  fair  to  add,  that,  as  a 
rule,  they  resulted  from  Ignorance  and  an  excess  of  zeal, 


rnr.  end  of  the  war.  347 

rather  than  from  a  spirit  of  wantonness  or  the  desire  of 
personal  gain.  By  some  curious  process,  the  average 
military  officials,  especially  those  from  other  States, 
appeared  to  have  satisfied  themselves  that  Missouri  was 
disloyal ;  and  acting  upon  this  conviction,  and  ignorant, 
perhaps,  of  the  fact  that  there  was  such  a  thing  as  mili- 
tary law,  they  not  unfrequently  conducted  themselves  in 
a  manner  that  would  hardly  have  been  justifiable  in  an 
enemy's  country.  Instead  of  discharging  the  delicate 
duties  of  their  office  in  such  a  way  as  to  give  as  little 
offense  as  possible,  they  acted  as  if  it  were  the  policy  to 
exasperate  the  people  among  whom  they  were  stationed, 
and  drive  them  into  the  rebel  army,  or,  worse  still,  into 
some  wild  and  predatory  band  of  guerrillas.  In  this, 
unfortunately  for  the  peace  of  the  State,  they  were  too 
often  successful. 

But  whilst  it  is  easy  to  acquit  the  ruling  authorities, 
civil  as  well  as  military,  of  complicity  in  outrages  com- 
mitted in  defiance  of  orders,  and  of  which  they  had  no 
knowledge,  it  is  not  possible  to  absolve  them  from  blame 
for  those  which  they  themselves  perpetrated,  or  which 
were  committed  with  their  knowledge,  and  presumably 
with  their  approval.  Take,  for  example,  the  outrages 
on  the  western  frontier  of  the  State,  —  those  perpetrated 
by  Union  troops  and  Kansas  Red-Legs  upon  Missou- 
rians,  as  well  as  those  committed  by  guerrillas  and  out- 
lawed Missourians  upon  the  people  of  Kansas, —  and, 
either  as  sins  of  omission  or  commission,  they  can  be 
traced  directly  to  mismanagement  on  the  part  of  the 
Federal  authorities. 

Without  stopping  to  enlarge  upon  the  crimes  of  Lane 
and  his  brigade,  to  which  reference  has  already  been 
made,  it  is  sufficient  to  say  that  in  1861  they  burned  the 


348  MISSOURI. 

town  of  Osceola,  "  an  enterprise  in  which  large  amounts 
of  property  and  a  score  of  lives  were  sacrificed  ;  "  that 
they  "  cleaned  out "  the  villages  of  Butler  and  Park- 
ville  ;  and,  in  a  word,  that  they  began  in  Missouri  the 
work  of  robbery  and  murder  which  resulted  in  depopu- 
lating a  large  j^art  of  the  western  border.  Following  in 
the  wake  of  this  brigade  of  "  thieves  and  marauders,"  as 
Governor  Robinson  is  said  to  have  called  them,  came  the 
bands  of  robbers  known  as  Red-Legs,  whose  custom 
it  was  "  at  intervals  to  dash  into  Missouri,  seize  horses 
and  cattle,  —  not  omitting  other  and  worse  outrages  on 
occasion,  —  then  to  repair  with  their  booty  to  Lawrence, 
where  it  was  defiantly  sold  at  auction."  These  depre- 
dations were  well  known  to  the  authorities.  In  Decem- 
ber, 1861,  General  Halleck,  who  seems  to  have  been 
powerless  to  remedy  the  evil,  wrote  to  McClellan  that 
"  the  conduct  of  our  troops  during  Fremont's  campaign, 
and  especially  the  course  pursued  by  those  under  Lane 
and  Jennison,  has  turned  against  us  many  thousands  who 
were  formerly  Union  men  ; "  and  on  another  occasion, 
when  speaking  of  the  rumor  that  Lane  had  been  made  a 
brigadier-general  in  the  Federal  army,  he  added  that  such 
an  appointment  "  is  offering  a  premium  for  rascality 
and  robbing  generally,"  and  that  "  it  will  take  twenty 
thousand  men  to  counteract  its  effect  in  the  State." 
This  letter  was  seen  by  President  Lincoln,  who  did  noth- 
ing to  bring  about  a  different  state  of  affairs  on  the  bor- 
der, though  he  signified  his  regret  that  Halleck  should 
have  entertained  such  an  unfavorable  opinion  of  Lane. 

If,  now,  we  reverse  the  shield,  we  shall  find  that  the 
outrages  of  Lane  and  the  Red-Legs  not  only  sent  a  num- 
ber of  men  into  the  Southern  army,  but  that  they  also 
drove  others   into  adopting   the    lawless  mode    of    life 


THE  END   OF   THE    WAR.  349 

known  as  "  bushwhacking."  The  number  of  those 
who  thus  outlawed  themselves  was  never  large,  certainly 
not  a  tenth  of  the  force  that  might  at  any  moment  have 
been  brought  against  them,  and  yet  such  was  the  ineffi- 
ciency of  the  Federal  authorities  that  these  guerrillas, 
aided  by  certain  hangers-on  to  the  Confederate  ariuj^, 
are  said  to  have  carried  on  a  savage  and,  we  may  add, 
a  seemingly  successful  predatory  war  with  the  Union 
troops,  as  well  as  with  their  freebooting  neighbors  over 
the  border.  This  result  was  clearly  foreseen  by  Gov- 
ernor Charles  Robinson  of  Kansas.  As  early  as  Sep- 
tember, 1861,  he  warned  Fremont  that  there  was  danger 
that  "  Lane's  brigade  will  get  up  a  war  by  going  over 
the  line,  committing  depredations,  and  then  returning 
into  our  State."  In  such  an  event  the  secessionists,  he 
said,  will  be  forced  to  retaliation,  "  and  in  this  they 
will  be  joined  by  nearly  all  the  Union  men  of  Missouri." 
In  the  same  letter  in  which  he  utters  this  warning  he 
bears  testimony  to  the  peaceful  disposition  then  prevail- 
ing an^ong  the  Missourians.  "  There  are,"  said  he, 
''  small  parties  of  secessionists  among  them,  but  we  have 
good  I'eason  to  know  that  they  do  not  intend  to  molest 
Kansas.  .  .  .  Indeed,  a  short  time  since,  when  a  guer- 
rilla party  came  over  and  stole  some  property  from  our 
citizens,  the  officers  in  command  of  the  Confederates 
compelled  a  return  of  the  property,  and  offered  to  give 
ujj  the  leader  of  the  gang  to  our  people  for  punishment. 
...  If  you  will  remove  the  supplies  at  Fort  Scott  to 
the  interior,"  he  adds,  "  and  relieve  us  of  the  Lane 
brigade,  I  will  guarantee  Kansas  from  invasion  .  .  .  until 
Jackson  shall  drive  you  from  St.  Louis." 

Unfortunately  for  the  peace  of   the  border,  neither 
the  protests  of  Robinson  and  Halleck,  nor  the  example 


350  MISSOURI. 

of  the  Confederates  in  offering  to  give  up  a  guerrilla, 
were  of  any  avail.  The  Kansas  marauders  were  per- 
mitted to  continue  their  depredations  without  any  seri- 
ous effort  on  the  j^art  of  the  Federal  authorities  to 
put  a  stop  to  them,  and  this  course,  as  had  been  fore- 
told, led  to  savage  repi-isals.  In  August,  1863,  a  band 
of  outlawed  Missourians,  maddened  by  the  atrocities 
that  were  committed  on  their  people,  made  a  descent 
upon  Lawrence,  Kansas,  burned  the  town,  and  slaugh- 
tered one  hundred  and  eighty-three  of  its  inhabitants. 
"  Jennison  has  laid  waste  our  homes,"  was  the  declara- 
tion of  more  than  one  Missourian  on  the  day  of  the 
massacre,  "and  the  Red-Legs  have  perpetrated  unheard- 
of  crimes.  Houses  have  been  plundered  and  burned, 
defenseless  men  shot  down,  and  women  outraged.  We 
are  here  for  revenge  —  and  we  have  got  it."  ^ 

This  savage  butchery,  indefensible  even  upon  the 
score  of  retaliation,  aroused  the  military  authorities  to  a 
sense  of  their  shortcomings  ;  and  on  the  25th  of  August, 
only  four  days  after  the  massacre,  General  Thomas 
Ewing  issued  an  order,  which  may  have  been  intended 
to  put  an  end  to  the  disgraceful  warfare  that  had  grown 
up  in  this  district,  but  which,  considered  as  a  military 
measure,  was,  fortunately,  without  a  parallel  in  Missouri. 
Listead  of  obliging  the  Kansas  robbers  to  stay  on  their 
own  side  of  the  border,  and  using  the  troops  at  his  com- 
mand to  drive  out  or  exterminate  the  "  bushwhackers," 
as  there  is  reason  to  believe  he  might  have  done,  and  as 
certainly  would  have  been  done  by  any  one  who  really 
desired  to  give  peace  to  the  border,  General  Ewing  is- 
sued an  order,  in  the  execution  of  which,  those  of  the 
inhabitants  of  Jackson,  Bates,  Cass,  and  a  part  of  Ver- 
^  Spring's  Kansas,  p.  287. 


THE  END   OF  THE  WAR.  351 

non  counties,  who  were  so  unfortunate  as  to  live  outside 
of  certain  limits,  were  driven  from  their  homes,  their 
dwellings  burned,  their  farms  laid  waste,  and  the  great 
bulk  of  their  movable  jjroperty  handed  over,  without 
let  or  hindrance,  to  the  Kansas  "  jayhawkers."  It  was 
a  brutal  order,  ruthlessly  enforced,  and  so  far  from 
expelling  or  exterminating  the  guerrillas,  it  simply 
handed  this  whole  district  over  to  them.  Indeed,  we 
are  assured  by  one  who  was  on  the  ground,  that  from 
this  time  until  the  end  of  the  war.  no  one  Avearing  the 
Federal  uniform  dared  risk  his  life  within  the  devas- 
tated region. 

The  only  people  whom  the  enforcement  of  the  order 
did  injure  were  some  thousands  of  those  whom  it  was 
Ewing's  duty  to  protect.  They  were  ruined ;  and  if 
possible  the  enormity  of  the  outrage  upon  them  was  in- 
creased by  the  fact  that,  fourteen  years  later,  General 
Schofield,  who  had  approved  of  the  order,  justified  his 
action  on  the  ground  that  they  were  mere  furnishers 
of  supplies  to  the  guerrillas,  when  in  point  of  fact, 
tried  by  any  known  standard,  they  were  as  loyal  to  the 
Union  as  were  their  neighbors  in  Kansas.  They  had 
voted  against  secession  ;  they  had  not  only,  thus  far, 
kept  their  quota  in  the  Union  army  full,  and  that  with- 
out draft  or  bounty,  but  they  continued  to  do  so  ;  and 
if  they  did  not  protect  themselves  against  the  outrages 
alike  of  Confederate  bushwhackers  and  Union  jay- 
hawkers, it  was  because  early  in  the  war  they  had  been 
disarmetl  by  Federal  authority,  and  were  consequently 
without  the  means  of  defense.  But  it  is  unnecessary 
to  pursue  this  subject  further.  Considered  as  a  military 
measure,  the  only  light  in  which  we  are  privileged  to 
regard  it,  this  order  was,  as  General  Blair  truly  said, 


352  MISSOURI. 

an  act  of  imbecility  —  a  confession  on  the  part  of  the 
Federal  commander  that  he  was  unwilling  or  unable 
to  put  down  the  bushwhackers  —  which  should  have  cost 
him  his  command  ;  and  neither  General  Schofield's  nor 
President  Lincoln's  approval  of  the  measure  can  change 
its  character,  though  it  may  divide  the  odium. 

A  wholesale  spoUation  of  this  character  was  hardly 
calculated  to  make  many  converts  among  the  secessionists 
proper,  and  as  it  did  not  commend  itself  to  the  great 
mass  of  the  Union  people,  and  utterly  failed  to  give 
peace  to  the  district  in  which  it  was  tried,  it  was  not 
repeated  elsewhere.  There  were,  however,  other  methods 
of  confiscation,  less  brutal,  perhaps,  but  equally  unjust, 
that  were  practiced,  and  always  with  the  same  evil  re- 
sult. Among  them,  the  favorite  seems  to  have  been  to 
assess  the  Southern  sympathizers  for  damage  done  by 
bushwhackers  and  Confederate  raiders,  or  for  the  pur- 
pose of  raising  a  fund  to  be  used  in  the  support  of 
Union  refugees  and  for  other  purposes.  Of  the  injus- 
tice of  such  a  proceeding  it  is  needless  to  speak.  The 
people  who  were  thus  called  upon  to  make  good  these 
losses,  or  contribute  to  the  charities  which  the  govern- 
ment should  have  maintained,  were  in  no  manner  re- 
sponsible for  the  injuries  which  they  were  called  upon  to 
repair.  Even  if  they  had  known  of  them,  they  could 
not  have  prevented  them  ;  and  yet  so  popular  was  this 
method  of  raising  money,  that,  in  August,  1862,  the 
Southern  sympathizers  in  St.  Louis  County  were  ordered 
to  be  assessed  in  the  sum  of  five  hundred  thousand 
dollars  for  the  purpose  of  arming  the  state  militia  and 
supporting  the  families  of  such  militiatuen  and  United 
States  volunteers  as  might  be  left  destitute.  As  if  to 
add  absurdity  to  injustice,  it  was  furthermore  proposed 


THE   KSD    OF  THE    WAR.  oOo 

to  grade  this  assessment  not  only  according  to  the  wealth 
of  the  individual,  but  according  to  the  supposed  degree 
of  his  sympathy  with  the  South.  In  other  words,  it  was 
proposed,  in  a  community  in  which  all  shades  of  opinion 
existed,  to  establish  a  dividing  line  between  loyalty  and 
disloyalty,  and  to  fix  the  rates  of  payment  of  those 
who  fell  below  the  standard  ;  and  this  was  to  be  done 
not  by  an  open  trial,  and  the  examination  of  witnesses 
under  oath,  but  by  a  board  sitting  in  secret  session  and 
obliged,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  to  rest  its  deci- 
sions upon  vague  rumors,  hearsay  evidence,  and  general 
impressions.  That  such  a  proposition  could  have  been 
seriously  entertained,  or  that  worthy  citizens  could  have 
been  found  who  were  willing  to  undertake  the  duties  of 
this  office,  is  almost  incredible  at  this  late  day  ;  but  it 
illustrates  very  clearly  the  spirit  that  then  ruled  in  some 
of  the  border  States.  Fortunately  for  the  good  name  of 
the  State,  the  Rev.  Dr.  William  G.  Eliot,  a  loyal  clergy- 
man of  St.  Louis,  called  President  Lincoln's  attention 
to  the  injustice  and  iniquity  of  this  measure,  and  it 
was  countermanded.  The  disapproval  of  this  particular 
order  of  assessment,  however,  did  not  put  an  end  to  the 
evil.  It  continued  to  flourish,  and  so  serious  did  it 
finally  become  that  Governor  Gamble,  in  December, 
1862,  forbade  the  militia  of  the  State  to  aid  in  carrying 
out  any  of  these  assessments,  thus  depriving  the  pro- 
vost marshals  of  the  services  of  these  troops,  and  to 
some  extent  putting  an  end  to  the  practice. 

Amongst  the  other  and  more  general  forms  in  which 
this  intei'ference  of  military  with  the  civil  administration 
manifested  itself,  may  be  mentioned  the  restrictions  that 
were  placed  upon  trade  and  commerce,  and  the  presence 
of  soldiers  at  the  polls.    With  the  first  of  these  measures 


354  MISSOURI. 

we  need  not  concern  ourselves.  It  was  a  serious  incon- 
venience to  the  people  of  the  State,  loyal  as  well  as  dis- 
loyal, and  a  positive  injury  to  many  ;  but  it  was  regarded 
as  a  necessary  precaution,  and  hence  it  was  willingly 
borne  even  by  those  who  suffered  most  from  its  enforce- 
ment. 

The  second  of  these  measures  cannot  be  dismissed 
in  this  summary  fashion.  The  presence  of  soldiers  at 
the  polls  is  never  a  pleasant  sight  to  a  people  accus- 
tomed to  self-government,  and  in  the  present  instance 
it  was  made  more  objectionable  by  the  fact  that  the 
reason  assigned  for  it  was  not  sufficient,  and  because 
it  involved  an  unnecessary  display  of  force  for  the  pur- 
pose of  carrying  out  an  unnecessary  and,  so  far  as  it  par- 
took of  the  nature  of  an  ex  i^ost  facto  law,  an  illegal 
ordinance.  There  were  never  any  grounds  for  suppos- 
ing that  those  who  were  disfranchised  by  the  ordinance 
of  June,  1862,  would  attempt  to  vote  ;  and  even  if  they 
had  been  allowed  to  do  so,  there  was  not  the  slightest 
probability  of  their  carrying  the  election.  To  intimate, 
then,  that  the  soldiers  were  permitted  at  the  polls  for  the 
purpose  of  preserving  order  and  preventing  intimidation, 
is  to  assert  that  the  loyal  voters  of  the  State,  although 
they  outnumbered  the  disloyal  in  the  proportion  of  two 
or  three  to  one,  would  not  preserve  order,  and  could  be 
so  far  intimidated  as  to  prevent  their  voting.  Such  a 
thing  might  have  been  possible  at  some  outlying  pre- 
cinct, or  in  some  guerrilla-infested  neighborhood  ;  but  to 
admit  it  of  the  State  at  large  is  to  cast  a  reflection  upon 
the  Union  men  which  is  certainly  undeserved.  Never- 
theless it  is  the  explanation  which  the  order,  relating  to 
the  election  of  November,  1862,  was  made  to  give  of 
itself ;  and  whilst  it  would  hardly  be  fair,  for  the  reason 


THE  END   OF   THE    WAR.  355 

just  given,  to  characterize  it  as  untrue,  it  would  be  ob- 
viously unsafe  to  accept  it  as  the  whole  truth.  This  will 
be  found  in  the  evident  determination  of  the  authorities 
to  enforce  the  ordinance  of  the  convention,  which  made 
an  oath  of  loyalty  to  the  United  States  and  the  provi- 
sional government  of  Missouri  a  condition  precedent  to 
voting.  In  other  words,  soldiers  were  encouraged  to  be 
at  the  polls  not  so  much  for  the  purpose  of  preventing 
any  person  from  being  intimidated,  as  of  intimidating 
any  one  who  might  attempt  to  vote  without  having  taken 
the  prescribed  oath.  In  the  language  of  the  order,  they 
were  "to  see  that  no  person  is  either  kept  from  the  polls 
by  intimidation,  or  in  any  way  interfered  with  in  voting 
at  the  polls  for  whatever  candidate  he  may  choose," 
though  in  a  previous  clause  they  were  virtually  in- 
structed that  no  person  was  to  be  allowed  to  vote  who 
did  not  j^ledge  himself  to  vote  in  a  particular  way. 

In  view  of  the  predominance  of  Union  men  in  the 
State,  this  course  was  unnecessary.  Indeed,  the  provi- 
sional authorities  themselves  soon  saw  it,  and  at  the 
next  election  —  the  one  held  in  November,  1863  —  they 
so  far  rectified  the  mistake  as  to  require  the  soldiers  to 
vote  in  their  camps.  This  was  a  step  in  the  right  direc- 
tion, but  it  did  not  go  far  enough.  The  test  oath  for 
voters  and  candidates,  which  had  been  adopted  as  a  safe- 
guard against  the  possibility  of  having  a  disloyal  govern- 
ment, was  retained  ;  and  although  there  was  never  any 
occasion  for  testing  its  utility  from  this  point  of  view, 
yet  in  theory  at  least  it  was  assumed  to  have  effected 
the  purpose  for  which  it  was  designed.  In  practice 
it  did  much  more,  for  it  led  to  results  that  were  not 
generally  contemplated.  By  disfranchising  those  who, 
whilst  not  being  secessionists,  would  not  pledge  them- 


356  MISSOURI. 

selves  not  to  aid  those  of  their  friends  and  relatives  who 
were,  it  vii'tually  handed  the  State  over  to  the  radical 
Eepublicans ;  and  what  was  far  worse,  it  furnished  them 
with  a  precedent  for  the  long  list  of  outrages  which  for 
some  years  made  an  election  in  Missouri  such  a  sorrow- 
ful travesty.  From  1862  to  1872  there  was  not  an 
election  held  in  the  State  that  could  be  called  either  full, 
fair,  or  free ;  and  this  result,  so  foreign  to  the  spirit  of 
our  institutions,  would  hardly  have  been  possible  but  for 
the  precedent  furnished  by  the  adoption  of  this  ordi- 
nance and  the  methods  taken  to  enforce  it. 

These  were  a  few  of  the  ills  which  grew  out  of  this 
interference  of  the  military  with  the  civil  authority,  and 
to  which  the  people  of  Missouri  were  subjected.  In  the 
North,  where  there  was,  substantially,  no  difference  of 
opinion,  the  evil  was  but  little  felt ;  but  in  the  border 
States,  where  every  shade  of  sentiment  existed,  it  was 
very  real,  and  there  can  be  no  question  as  to  the  influ- 
ence it  exerted.  Grievous  as  it  was,  and  numerous  as 
were  the  individual  cases  of  oppression  to  which  it  gave 
rise,  it  did  not  affect  the  action  of  the  Union  men  of  the 
State  upon  the  one  great  issue  of  the  war.  Upon  this 
point  their  conduct  was  uniformly  consistent,  and  what- 
ever may  have  been  their  differences  of  opinion  as  to 
the  means  employed  to  restore  the  Union,  they  never 
wavered  in  their  fidelity  to  it.  In  fact,  so  determined 
were  their  efforts  in  this  direction  that  they  not  only 
succeeded  in  establishing  order  over  the  greater  part  of 
the  State,  especially  in  those  regions  in  which  they  were 
not  hampered  by  Federal  interference,  but  they  an- 
swered every  demand  made  upon  them  by  the  national 
authorities  for  men,  without  a  draft,  and  with  but  a  rel- 
atively small  expenditure  for  bounties. 


THE   END   OF  THE    WAR.  3o7 

Notwithstanding  the  heavy  contingent  which  the  State 
sent  into  the  Confederate  service,  she  furnished  to  the 
Union  army  109,000  men,  over  nine  per  cent,  of  her 
entire  population,  or  forty-seven  per  cent,  of  the  num- 
ber available  for  military  purposes.  The  extent  of  this 
drain  will  be  better  understood  if  we  compare  it  with  the 
number  of  men  furnished  by  the  other  States.  Accord- 
ing to  the  official  reports,  the  percentage  of  troops  to 
pojiulation  in  the  Western  States  and  Territories  was 
13.6  per  cent.,  and  in  the  New  England  States  twelve 
per  cent.  ;  whilst  in  Missouri,  if  we  add  to  her  quota  the 
30,000  men  who  went  into  the  Southern  army,  it  was 
fourteen  per  cent.,  or  sixty  per  cent,  of  those  who  were 
subject  to  military  duty.  These  are  instructive  figures, 
and  they  become  more  so  when  taken  in  connection  with 
the  fact  that  at  the  presidential  election  of  1860,  Lin- 
coln had  but  a  tenth  of  the  vote  cast  in  the  State. 

Of  the  loss  of  life  among  the  Missouri  troops.  Confed- 
erate as  well  as  Federal,  it  is  impossible  to  speak  with 
accuracy,  as  there  is  no  record  of  the  mortality  of  those 
who  went  South.  In  the  Union  army,  the  deaths  are  put 
down  at  13,885  —  a  fraction  over  twelve  per  cent,  of  all 
the  men  furnished  by  the  State,  —  of  which  number 
3,317  were  either  killed,  or  died  of  wounds  received  in 
battle.  These  are  the  official  figures,  and  they  are  no 
doubt  correct  as  far  as  they  go,  though  it  is  doubtful 
whether  they  Include  the  number  of  deaths  among  the 
state  troops,  who  were  never  in  the  service  of  the  United 
States.  Of  the  mortality  among  the  Confederates  we 
are,  as  has  been  said,  without  any  official  record ;  and 
the  facts  upon  which  we  have  to  depend  are  of  such  a 
character  that  any  attempt  to  fix  the  number  of  deaths 
among  them  must  be  but  the  merest  guess-work.     It  is 


358  MISSOURI. 

probable,  however,  that  the  ratio  among  them,  especially 
in  the  cases  of  deaths  fi'om  disease,  was  much  greater 
than  among  the  Union  troojjs,  owing  to  the  unwonted 
hardships  they  were  called  upon  to  endure,  and  the  want 
of  medicines  and  suitable  hospital  accommodations  for 
the  sick  and  wounded.  Taking  these  facts  into  consider- 
ation, and  bearing  in  mind  the  privations  to  which  they 
were  unavoidably  subjected  in  the  way  of  an  insufficiency 
of  food  and  clothing,  it  is  believed  that  an  estimate, 
placing  the  total  number  of  their  deaths  at  forty  per 
cent.,  would  be  within  the  bounds  of  reason.  This  would 
carry  their  loss  up  to  12,000  men,  and  adding  this  number 
to  the  deaths  that  occurred  in  the  Federal  service,  it 
will  swell  the  aggregate  mortality  in  the  two  armies  to 
25,885.  This  estimate  does  not  cover  those  who  were 
killed  in  the  skirmishes  that  took  place  between  the 
home  guards  and  the  guerrillas  ;  nor  does  it  include 
those  who  were  not  in  either  army,  but  who  were  shot 
down  by  "  bushwhackers  "  and  "  bushwhacking  "  Federal 
soldiers.  Of  these  latter  there  is  no  record,  though 
there  were  but  few  sections  of  the  State  in  which  such 
scenes  were  not  more  or  less  frequent.  Assuming  the 
deaths  from  these  two  sources  to  have  been  1,200,  and 
summing  up  the  results,  it  will  be  found  that  the  num- 
ber of  Mlssourians  who  were  killed  in  the  war  and  died 
from  disease  during  their  term  of  service  amounted  to 
not  less  than  27,000  men. 

Heavy  as  was  this  loss  of  life,  that  of  property  was 
relatively  quite  as  great.  Leaving  out  of  consideration 
the  value  of  the  slaves,  which  may  be  roughly  estimated 
at  $40,000,000,  the  other  elements  of  wealth  exhibit  a 
marked  decrease  during  the  war  and  after.  As  late  as 
1868,  after  two  years  of  prosperity,  the  taxable  wealth  of 


THE  END   OF   THE    WAR.  359 

the  State  was  rated  at  only  $454,000,000,  or  $46,000,000 
less  than  the  amount  returned  in  1860.  In  many  por- 
tions of  tlie  State,  especially  in  the  southern  and  west- 
ern horders,  whole  counties  had  been  devastated.  The 
houses  were  burned,  the  fences  destroyed,  and  the  farms 
laid  waste.  Much  of  the  livestock  of  the  State  had  dis- 
appeared ;  and  everywhere,  even  in  those  sections  that 
were  comparatively  quiet  and  peaceful,  the  quantity  of 
land  in  cultivation  Avas  much  less  than  it  had  been  at  the 
outbreak  of  the  war.  Added  to  these  sources  of  decline, 
and  in  some  measure  a  cause  of  them,  was  the  consider- 
able emigration  from  the  State  which  now  took  place, 
and  particularly  from  those  regions  that  lay  in  the  path- 
way of  the  armies,  or  from  those  neighborhoods  that 
were  given  over  to  the  "  bushwhackers."  The  amount  of 
loss  from  these  different  sources  cannot  be  accurately 
gauged,  but  some  idea  may  be  formed  of  it,  and  of  the 
unsettled  condition  of  affairs,  from  the  fact  that  only  41 
out  of  the  113  counties  in  the  State  receipted  for  the  tax 
books  for  1861 ;  and  in  these  counties,  only  $250,000 
out  of  the  $600,000  charged  against  them  were  collected. 
In  the  last  two  yeai's  of  the  war,  the  collections  in  por- 
tions of  the  State  are  said  to  have  been  better,  though 
they  were  still  far  from  satisfactory  ;  and  yet,  notwith- 
standing these  unfavorable  conditions,  the  State  expended 
over  $7,000,000  in  fitting  out  and  mauitaining  her  troops. 
The  bulk  of  this  sum  was  afterwards  returned  to  her 
by  the  general  government,  and  as  it  was  used  in  paying 
the  indebtedness  which  she  had  failed  to  meet  during 
the  war,  it  enabled  her  to  reestablish  her  credit  upon 
the  favorable  basis  upon  which  it  now  rests. 

Of  the  numerous    and  daring  raids  that  were  made 
into  the  State  we  have  not  thought  it  necessary  to  speak, 


360  MISSOURI. 

as  they  had  no  appreciable  influence  upon  the  result, 
either  in  Missouri  or  upon  the  country  at  large.  Even 
when  intended  to  mask  some  important  movement,  or  to 
prevent  reinforcements  from  being  sent  to  a  threatened 
point,  they  can  hardly  be  considered  as  successful,  since, 
as  a  rule,  after  the  spring  of  1862,  the  state  troops  and 
the  enrolled  militia  could  be  depended  upon  to  give  a 
satisfactory  account  of  these  most  unwelcome  visitors. 
Such,  though,  was  not  always  the  case,  and  notably  so 
in  the  raid  led  by  Price  in  Sejjtember,  1864.  Entering 
the  southeastern  portion  of  the  State  at  the  head  of 
12,000  men,  this  gallant  officer  came  within  forty  miles 
of  St.  Louis,  passed  in  sight  of  Jefferson  City,  and  mov- 
ing up  the  Missouri,  captured  Lexington  and  Indepen- 
dence. Here  he  was  confronted  by  troops  from  Kansas, 
and  being  closely  followed  by  General  Pleasonton  with 
a  large  force  of  cavalry,  he  turned  southward  and  made 
his  escape  into  Arkansas,  but  not  without  heavy  loss  in 
men  and  material.  In  the  course  of  the  raid  he  marched 
1,434  miles,  fought  forty-three  battles  and  skirmishes,  and 
according  to  his  own  calculation  destroyed  upwards  of 
"  ten  million  dollars  worth  of  property,"  a  fair  share  of 
which  belonged  to  his  own  friends. 

Considered  with  reference  to  the  number  of  men,  the 
distance  marched,  the  battles  fought,  and  the  amount  of 
property  destroyed,  this  was  one  of  the  most  memorable 
raids  of  the  war  ;  and  yet  it  is  difficult  to  see  what  the 
Confederate  authorities  expected  to  gain  by  the  move- 
ment. Price  was  not  strong  enough  to  maintain  him- 
self in  the  State  against  the  overwhelming  odds  that 
could  be  concentrated  against  him,  and  without  some 
such  prospect  his  expedition  was  a  predestined  failure. 
As  matters  turned  out,  it  did  not  prevent  reinforcements 


THE  END   OF  THE   WAR.  361 

from  being  sent  to  Thomas  at  Nashville,  nor  did  it  exei't 
any  perceptible  influence  upon  the  presidential  election  of 
that  year.  The  property  destroyed,  at  least  that  part  of 
it  which  belonged  to  the  federal  government,  was  never 
missed  ;  and  it  is  probable  that,  after  making  due  allow- 
ance for  the  exaggerations  on  both  sides,  Price  lost,  in 
men  and  material,  quite  as  much  as  he  gained. 

This  was  the  last  effort  made  to  carry  the  war  into 
Missouri.  In  the  following  spring  Grant  and  Lee  closed 
in  the  death  struggle  around  Richmond,  and  in  the  pres- 
ence of  this  battle  of  giants  all  minor  combats  were 
dwarfed.  AVlien  at  last,  on  the  9th  of  April,  it  was 
known  that  the  Confederate  army,  reduced  to  a  mere 
handful  but  still  ready  for  duty,  had  surrendered,  the 
news  brought  a  universal  feeling  of  relief.  By  a  proc- 
lamation of  Governor  Fletcher  the  15th  was  set  apart 
as  a  day  of  thanksgiving  for  "  this  hope  of  peace,"  and 
there  were  but  few  Missourians,  Union  men  or  secession- 
ists, who  did  not  join  in  the  glad  acclaim. 

In  due  time  the  Confederate  forces  on  the  west  side  of 
the  Mississippi  laid  down  their  arms,  and  in  June  some 
eight  thousand  of  them  arrived  in  St.  Louis.  Speaking 
of  this  event,  the  "  Republican  "  of  that  city  held  the  fol- 
lowing language,  which,  mutatis  mutandis,  may  witk 
equal  justice  be  applied  to  the  gallant  men  wlio  followed 
the  flag  of  the  Union.  '•  In  a  few  days  all  that  por- 
tion of  the  rebel  amuy  which  was  recruited  in  Missouri, 
with  the  exception  of  a  few  who  prefer  to  remain  in 
the  South,  .  .  .  will  have  returned  to  their  farms,  or 
their  former  places  of  labor  or  business  tlu'oughout  the 
State,  and  their  character,  habits  and  feeling  as  sol- 
diers will  disappear  as  they  resume  their  old  habits  as 
citizens." 


362  MISSOURI. 

These  pleasing  anticipations  were  soon  realized,  though 
in  certain  portions  of  the  State,  especially  along  the 
southern  and  western  bordei-s,  the  guei-rillas  and  ma- 
rauders of  all  kinds  showed  an  unwillingness  to  give  up 
their  freebooting  habits  and  return  to  an  orderly  mode 
of  life.  The  state  authorities,  however,  proved  equal  to 
the  occasion.  Governor  Fletcher  ordered  a  large  force 
into  the  disturbed  districts,  and  this,  taken  in  connection 
with  the  summary  action  of  the  people  in  certain  counties, 
soon  stamped  out  the  evil.  The  turbulent  spirits  bred 
by  the  war,  federal  as  well  as  rebel,  were  soon  made  to 
understand  that  the  civil  authority  was  again  supreme, 
and  that  crime,  no  matter  of  what  character  or  by  whom 
committed,  could  no  longer  be  cloaked  under  the  guise 
of  military  necessity.  In  these  disturbances  the  old 
soldiers,  the  men  who  had  faced  each  other  in  the  battle- 
field, were  not  arrayed  on  opposite  sides,  but  they  stood 
together  for  the  maintenance  of  law  and  order.  In  the 
hard  school  of  the  war  they  had  learned  to  respect  each 
other,  and  as  they  had  put  away  all  feelings  of  hatred 
and  uncharitableness  when  they  laid  aside  their  muskets, 
they  found  no  difficulty  in  working  together  for  the  sup- 
pression of  crime,  the  restoration  of  order,  and  the  good 
of  the  State. 


CHAPTER  XVII. 

ABOLITION   OF   SLAVERY.      THE   CONVENTION   OF   1865 
AND    TEST    OATHS. 

Turning  now  to  the  political  history  of  these  years 
we  find  that  although  the  Emancipation  Proclamation 
of  President  Lincoln  did  not  apply  to  Missouri,  yet  the 
question  of  the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  State  entered 
largely  into  the  local  politics  of  the  day.  At  the  elec- 
tion held  in  November,  1862,  for  members  of  the  Gen- 
eral Assembly,  a  majority  of  emancipationists  were  re- 
turned, though  they  were  unable  to  take  any  definite 
action  in  the  matter,  owing  to  the  exhausted  condition 
of  the  state  treasury,  and  to  the  constitutional  provision, 
which  forbade  the  emancipation  of  slaves  without  the 
consent  of  the  owners,  or  the  payment  of  a  full  equiva- 
lent for  the  slaves  so  freed.  Satisfied  that  the  people 
of  the  State  were  in  favor  of  doing  away  with  slavery, 
the  legislature  indicated  it  so  plainly  that  Governor 
Gamble  summoned  the  convention  to  meet  on  the  15th 
of  June,  1863,  for  the  purpose  of  acting  upon  the  ques- 
tion. After  a  prolonged  debate,  an  ordinance  was 
adopted  which  provided  for  gradual  emancipation,  and 
the  convention  then  adjourned  sine  die. 

The  plan  as  adopted  was  as  just  and  fair  as  any  meas- 
ure of  confiscation  can  be  said  to  be,  but  it  did  not  sat- 
isfy the  radical  Republicans  of  the  State.  They  wanted 
to  have  the  slaves  made  free  at  once,  and  to  effect  this. 


364  MissovRf. 

they  sent  a  committee  to  Washington  foi'  the  purpose  of 
inducing  President  Lincohi  to  extend  the  area  within 
which  his  proclamation  was  operative,  so  as  to  inchide 
Missouri.  Failing  in  the  object  of  their  visit,  they  re- 
turned home,  and  at  once  began  their  preparations  for 
the  election  of  November,  1864.  Upon  the  direct  issue 
of  immediate  and  unconditional  emancipation  they 
carried  the  State  by  a  majority  of  30,000,  though  the 
total  vote  was  but  little  more  than  half  what  it  had  been 
four  years  before.  It  was  the  first  election  for  state 
officers  that  had  been  held  since  the  beginning  of  the 
war,  Provisional  Governor  Gamble  having  been  ap- 
pointed by  the  convention,  as  was  Lieutenant  Governor 
W.  P.  Hall,  who  became  governor  upon  the  death  of 
Gamble  in  January,  1864. 

The  proposition  to  hold  another  convention  having 
been  carried,  the  delegates  chosen  to  that  body  met  at 
St.  Louis  on  the  6th  of  January,  1865.  Divided  accord- 
ing to  their  nativities,  it  will  be  seen  that  thirty-five 
of  them  were  born  in  the  slave  States,  twenty-one  in  the 
free  States,  nine  in  Europe,  and  one  is  not  given.  Politi- 
cally speaking,  they  were,  as  a  rule,  new  men.  But  few 
of  them  were  known  outside  of  their  immediate  neighbor- 
hood, and  it  is  but  fair  to  add,  in  view  of  the  specimen 
of  political  handiwork  which  they  turned  out,  that  still 
fewer  of  them  were  ever  heard  of  again.  The  constitu- 
tion which  they  framed,  despite  certain  good  provisions, 
evinced  such  a  spirit  of  political  intolerance,  showed  so 
clearly  that  its  authors  were  unfit  for  statesmanlike  work, 
that  they  were  speedily  relegated  to  the  obscurity  from 
which  they  should  never  have  been  taken.  Unquestion- 
ably much  of  the  bitter  feeling  displayed  in  this  instru- 
ment can  be  ascribed  to  the  excitement  of  the  hour,  and 


ABOLITION  OF  SLAVEKl'.  305 

it  would  no  doubt  ))e  pleasant  if  it  could  all  be  assigned 
to  this  cause.  Unfortunately  foi'  this  theory,  the  course 
of  the  radicals  in  carrying  out  these  invidious  restric- 
tions, after  the  necessity  for  them  had  passed  away,  af- 
fords ground  for  the  belief  that  their  object  in  adopting 
them  was  not  so  much  to  punish  the  rebels,  as  it  was  to 
give  the  control  of  the  State  to  the  wing  of  the  Repub- 
lican party  to  which  they  belonged. 

The  first  measure  ujjon  which,  under  the  terms  of  the 
call,  the  convention  was  expected  to  act,  was  the  one  for 
the  abolition  of  slavery.  This  was  soon  settled.  On  the 
11th  of  January  George  P.  Strong,  of  St.  Louis,  reported 
"  An  Okdinance  abolishing  Slavery  in  Missouri," 
and  recommended  its  passage.  Various  attempts  were 
made  to  amend  it,  but  they  were  voted  down,  and  the 
ordinance,  as  reported,  was  passed  by  a  practically 
unanimous  vote,  there  being  sixty  for  it,  to  four  against 
it,  whilst  two  were  absent.  A  copy  of  the  Ordinance, 
duly  signed  and  attested,  was  forwarded  by  special  mes- 
senger to  Governor  Fletcher,  and  in  accordance  with  the 
request  of  the  convention  he  issued  a  proclamation,  de- 
claring "  that  henceforth  and  forever,  no  person  within 
the  jurisdiction  of  the  State  shall  be  subject  to  any 
abridgment  of  liberty,  except  such  as  the  law  shall  pre- 
scribe for  the  common  good,  or  know  any  master  but 
God." 

At  this  time  there  were  jirobably  a  hundred  and 
fourteen  thousand  negroes  in  the  State,  worth  for  pur- 
})oses  of  taxation  forty  millions  of  dollars.  Ostensibly 
they  were  slaves,  but  practically  they  were  not,  for  it 
was  clearly  understood,  even  by  the  slaveholders,  that 
the  institution  in  Missouri  was  dead,  and  that  all  that 
remained  to  be  done  was  to  see  that  it  was   decently 


366  MISSOURI. 

and  legally  buried.  The  opportunity  to  do  this  was 
afforded  by  the  convention  ;  and  in  promptly  availing 
themselves  of  it,  the  people  of  IVIissouri  may  justly 
claim  for  her  the  credit  of  being  the  only  one  of  the 
slave  States  which  voluntarily  and  of  its  own  accord 
abolished  slavery.  As  we  have  repeatedly  had  occasion 
to  declare,  the  people  of  the  State  had  never  been  enam- 
ored of  the  institution,  had  in  fact  tolerated  it  from 
an  unwillingness  to  interfere  with  vested  rights  ;  and 
in  striking  it  down  they  not  only  gave  abundant  proof 
of  this  fact,  and  at  a  cost,  to  the  State,  of  a  portion  of 
the  revenue  of  which  she  was  sorely  in  need,  but  they 
again  served  notice  upon  the  Confedei-ate  authorities 
that  Missouri  was  in  the  Union  and  proposed  to  stay 
there. 

Having  disclosed  of  this  question  in  a  satisfactory 
manner,  the  convention  might  well  have  adjourned,  as 
the  disfranchisement  of  the  rebels,  the  one  other  matter 
upon  which  it  was  expected  that  action  would  be  taken, 
had  been  accomplished  by  the  convention  which  met  in 
June,  1862,  so  far  as  it  was  possible  to  effect  that  pur- 
pose by  a  constitutional  enactment.  This  action  was  by 
no  means  satisfactory  to  the  members  of  the  present 
convention.  From  the  first  they  had  fallen  under  the 
control  of  a  few  extremists,  who  were  determined  to  be 
satisfied  with  nothing  less  than  a  thorough  remodeling 
of  the  constitution  ;  and  under  their  lead  it  was  com- 
placently resolved  that  the  people  ''  intended  and  ex- 
pected "  not  only  that  slavery  should  be  abolished  and 
disloyalists  disfranchised,  but  that  the  constitution  should 
be  so  amended  as  to  bring  it  into  harmony  with  the 
change  that  had  taken  place  in  the  industrial  and  po- 
litical condition  of  the  State.     Doubtful  as  this  measure 


ABOLITION   OF  SLAVERY.  367 

was  from  a  legal  point  of  view,  the  members  of  the 
convention  thonght  proper  to  regard  it  as  tantamount  to 
a  removal  of  the  restrictions  imposed  upon  them  by  the 
call  under  which  they  met ;  and  they  proceeded  to  frame 
an  entirely  new  constitution.  This  was  submitted  to 
the  peojDle,  for  ratification,  in  June,  1865,  and  was  ac- 
cepted by  a  majority  of  eighteen  hundred  in  a  total 
vote  of  eighty -five  thousand. 

In  some  of  its  articles,  notably  in  those  that  related 
to  education  and  to  banks  and  cor^jorations,  the  new 
constitution  was  a  decided  improvement  upon  the  one 
adopted  iix  1820,  and  still  in  force;  but  in  the  article 
on  the  right  of  suffrage,  especially  in  the  clause  which 
established  a  test  oath  for  voters,  there  were  features 
that  were  so  outrageous  as  to  outweigh  the  good  that 
might  have  come  from  those  provisions  that  were  clearly 
of  a  beneficent  character.  Without  stopping  to  enu- 
merate the  objections  that  might  be  urged  against  this 
particular  clause,  it  will  be  sufficient  to  say  that  the 
oath  as  established  was  so  comprehensive  in  its  scope, 
and  covered  such  a  wide  field  of  conduct  past  and  future, 
that  it  is  doubtful  whether  there  was  a  jirominent  man 
in  the  State  who  could  truthfully  have  taken  it.  Includ- 
ing subdivisions,  there  were  over  forty -five  different 
offenses  which  the  applicant  for  registration  must  swear 
he  had  never  committed  ;  and  unless  he  could  do  so,  he 
was  not  to  be  allowed  to  vote,  or  hold  any  state,  county, 
or  municipal  office,  or  act  as  a  teacher  in  any  school,  or 
preach,  or  solemnize  marriage,  or  practice  law,  or  serve 
as  juror.  He  could  not  even  hold  any  real  estate,  or 
other  property,  in  trust  for  the  use  of  any  church,  re- 
ligious society,  or  congregation. 

In  the  attempt  to  enforce  this  iniquitous  ordinance, 


368  MISSOURI. 

much  trouble  occurred.  The  judges  of  the  supreme 
court,  satisfied  that  it  was  null  and  void,  refused  to  va- 
cate their  offices,  and  were  forcibly  ousted.  Ministers 
of  the  gospel,  Catholic  priests,  and  sisters  of  charity  en- 
gaged in  teaching  were  arrested,  and  in  some  cases  fined 
and  imprisoned.  Prominent  lawyers  like  Samuel  T. 
Glover,  a  member  of  the  Union  safety  committee  in 
1861,  refused  to  abide  by  the  law  and  challenged  indict- 
ment ;  and  when  in  November,  1865,  that  gallant  sol- 
dier General  Frank  Blair  refused  to  take  the  oath  and 
brought  suit  against  the  judges  of  the  election  for  de- 
clining to  receive  his  vote,  it  was  felt,  even  by  those 
who  had  apjiroved  the  ordinance,  that  the  time  had  come 
when  its  enforcement  was  no  longer  possible.  At  the 
meeting  of  the  legislature,  in  January,  1867,  Governor 
Fletcher,  who  had  oj^posed  the  adoption  of  the  con- 
stitution, recommended  that  the  9th  section  of  the  2d 
article  should  be  stricken  out  for  the  reason  that  it  had 
not  prevented  disloyal  persons  from  being  lawyers  and 
school-teachers,  and  because  "  bishops,  priests,  and  min- 
isters teach  and  pray  without  taking  the  prescribed 
oath,"  thereby  setting  an  example  of  disobedience  to 
law,  which  may  ultimately  lead  to  anarchy.  Before  the 
legislature  could  act  upon  his  recommendation,  the  su- 
preme court  of  the  United  States,  in  January,  1867, 
decided  that  the  test  oath  was  unconstitutional. 

The  announcement  of  this  decision  gave  a  measure 
of  relief  to  the  people  of  the  State,  though  the  reign  of 
intolerance  was  not  yet  over.  The  test  oath  and  the 
methods  taken  to  enforce  it  had  brought  a  number  of 
exceedingly  small  men  to  the  front ;  and  as  they  were 
naturally  desirous  of  prolonging  their  lease  of  power, 
they   adopted,  in  January,   1868,   another  registry  law 


ABOLITION   OF  SLAVERY.  3G9 

which  was  even  more  stringent  than  the  one  it  super- 
seded. Under  it,  the  governor,  hy  and  with  the  advice 
and  consent  of  the  Senate,  was  authorized,  at  every 
general  election,  to  appoint  a  superintendent  of  registi'a- 
tion  in  each  senatorial  district.  These  superintendents 
appointed  a  board  of  registration  for  each  county,  to 
whom  was  committed  the  whole  electoral  machinery  of 
the  State,  with  power  to  purge  tlie  voting  lists  at  their 
own  sweet  wiU.  In  the  hands  of  facile  officials  it  was 
easy,  under  this  law,  to  produce  any  given  result,  and 
there  can  be  no  doubt  as  to  the  unflinching  manner  in 
which  this  privilege  of  purgation  was  exercised  in  some 
portions  of  the  State.  At  the  election  in  November, 
1868,  the  radicals  were  successful,  J.  W.  McClurg  their 
candidate  being  chosen  governor  by  a  majority  of  over 
19,000,  though  the  aggregate  vote  was  only  145,000, 
20,000  less  than  it  had  been  in  1860. 

Efficacious  as  this  law  had  proved  to  be  when  judged 
from  a  party  point  of  view,  it  did  not  enable  the  radi- 
cals to  retain  control  of  the  State.  The  liberal  Republi- 
cans as  they  were  called,  under  the  lead  of  B.  Gratz 
Brown  and  Carl  Scliurz,  had  long  been  restive  under 
this  harsh  legislation,  and  they  now  took  issue  with  the 
radical  wing  of  their  party  upon  the  question  of  uni- 
versal amnesty  and  universal  enfranchisement.  With 
the  aid  of  such  Democrats  as  were  allowed  to  vote,  they 
swept  the  State  at  the  election  held  in  the  autumn  of 
1870.  In  justice,  however,  to  Governor  McClurg  and 
the  General  Assembly  it  must  be  said  that,  in  point  of 
liberality,  they  showed  themselves  to  be  in  advance  of 
their  party.  In  his  inaugural  message  the  governor 
had  called  attention  to  the  policy  of  removing  the  dis- 
abilities that  had  been  imposed  ujion  those  who  were 


370  MISSOURI. 

upon  the  side  of  the  South  during  the  war ;  and  at  a 
special  meeting  of  tlie  legislature  in  January,  1870,  it 
was  resolved  to  submit  to  the  people,  for  ratification, 
certain  proposed  amendments  to  the  constitution  of  the 
State,  which  virtually  covered  this  ground.  By  one  of 
these  amendments  the  test  oath  for  voters  was  abolished  ; 
another  removed  the  disqualifications  that  had  been  im- 
posed on  account  of  former  acts  of  disloyalty,  and  also 
those  that  were  due  to  race,  color,  or  previous  condition 
of  servitude  ;  a  third  related  to  education  ;  and  there 
were  still  others  that  referred  to  the  courts  and  to  banks 
and  corporations.  All  of  these  amendments  were  adopted, 
and  at  the  same  election  B.  Gratz  Brown,  the  liberal 
candidate,  was  chosen  governor  by  a  majority  of  41,000 
in  a  total  vote  of  166,000.  This,  it  will  be  observed, 
is  only  one  thousand  more  than  were  cast  ten  years 
before,  at  the  election  of  1860,  though  the  population 
of  the  State  was  now  1,728,000,  or  540,000  greater  than 
it  then  was. 

The  repeal  of  these  disfranchising  and  disqualifying 
laws  swept  away  the  last  vestige  of  the  intolerant  legis- 
lation that  grew  out  of  the  war ;  and  at  the  election 
of  November,  1872,  the  Democratic  party,  composed 
largely  of  consei'vative  Union  men  like  Blair,  Broad- 
head,  Phelps,  and  others,  carried  the  State  by  a  majority 
of  35,000  in  a  total  poll  of  278,000.  Compared  with 
the  vote  of  1870,  it  will  be  observed  that  the  increase  in 
two  years  amounted  to  112,000.  This  is  too  large  to 
be  attributed  to  natural  causes  ;  and  whilst  it  would  be 
manifestly  unjust  to  assert  that  it  represents  the  number 
of  persons  who  were  disfranchised,  yet  it  gives  good 
ground  for  the  conclusion  that  the  number  of  those  who 
were  affected  by  this  measure  was  much  larger  than  is 
usually  supposed. 


ABOLITION   OF  SLAVERY.  371 

With  the  success  of  the  Democrats  at  this  election, 
the  control  of  the  State  passed  into  the  hands  of  those 
who  were  entitled  to  it  by  virtue  of  their  numbers  ;  and 
they  still  retain  it.  Of  their  management  of  affairs  it 
is  not  my  purpose  to  speak.  Neither  does  it  come  within 
the  limits  of  this  work  to  treat  of  the  rapid  recovery  of 
the  State  from  the  wounds  of  the  civil  war  ;  of  her  phe- 
nomenal increase  in  wealth  and  population  during  the 
five  years  immediately  succeeding  the  return  of  peace, 
or  of  the  liberality  which  she  has  displayed  in  advanc- 
ing the  negro  to  all  the  privileges  of  citizenship.  Facts 
upon  these  points  are  accessible  to  all,  and  as  they  con- 
tain within  themselves  the  germs  of  actions  whose  re- 
sults have  yet  to  be  worked  out,  their  discussion  belongs 
to  the  political  economist,  and  would  be  out  of  place  at 
this  time  and  in  this  connection.  The  career  of  Missouri, 
or  rather  that  portion  of  it  which  belongs  to  the  domain 
of  history,  may  be  said  to  have  been  ended  with  the 
abolition  of  slavery.  For  fifty  years  and  more  this  had 
been  the  issue  upon  which  parties,  in  their  struggle  for 
power,  had  been  aligned ;  and  during  all  this  period, 
through  no  desire  of  their  own,  but  in  opposition  to  their 
wishes  as  It  was  to  their  interests,  it  had  furnished  the 
people  of  the  State  with  the  motive  for  much  of  their 
political  action.  With  Its  removal  from  the  field  of 
contention,  the  motive  also  disappeared  ;  but  in  its  place 
we  have  new  Interests,  and  these  will  give  rise  to  new 
issues,  around  which  parties  will  form.  This  will  again 
bring  on  the  struggle  for  power  which  In  some  shape 
has  been  going  on  since  the  formation  of  society,  and 
will  continue  as  long  as  human  nature  remains  un- 
chanaed. 


INDEX. 


Ailams,  Jolm  Quincy,  79,  80,  144,  161, 

ISO,  11)3. 
Agriculture,  24,  26. 
Alabama,  admitted,  141. 
AUouez,  Fatlier,  6. 
Almonaster,  Don  Andres,  47. 
Almonte,  General,  191,  198. 
Amusements,  48. 

Arabe,  Jose  Ignacio,  letter  of,  210. 
Archuleta,  Don  Diego,  201,  212,  217. 
Arista,  General,  199. 
Arkansas,  admission  of,  144. 
Armijo,  Governor,  201,  212. 
Arsenal,   St.   Louis,    importance    of, 

291,  294,  299  ;  garrisoned,  297. 
Assessments,  352. 
Atchison,  D.  R.,  244,  246. 
Atlantic  coa.st,  colonized,  3. 
Augney,  Captain,  215,  216. 

Backwoodsman,  the,  96. 

Balance  of  power,  140-246. 

Banks,  chartered,  133,  165,  168 ;  sus- 
pension of,  164-166. 

Barbe-Marbois,  77. 

Barter,  45. 

Barton,  David,  174. 

Bates,  Edward,  296. 

Bates,  Frederick,  123. 

Bell,  Major  W.  H.,  292,  294. 

Bent,  Governor  Cliarles,  204,212,214, 
217. 

Benton,  Thomas  H.,  174,  186, 212,  227, 
228,  229-233  ;  his  appeal  to  the  peo- 
ple, 222,  225 ;  elected  to  Congress, 
231. 

Biddle,  Major,  report  on  fur  trade,  129. 

Bienville,  20,  24,  26. 

Blair,  F.  P.,  Jr.,  178, 204, 274, 277, 291, 
293,  296,  305,  351. 

Blandowski,  Captain,  killed,  30G. 

Bledsoe,  Captain  H.,  315. 

Blue  lodges,  243. 

Boone,  Daniel,  58. 

Boonville,  .skirmish  at,  313. 

Border  troubles,  347. 

Bo  wen,  General  John  S.,  258. 


Bracito,  skirmish  at,  207. 
Broadhead,  James  O.,  290,  370. 
Browne,  Joseph,  87. 
Brown,  B.  Gratz,  178,  369,  370. 
Brown,  John,  251,  252,  255. 
Bruff,  Major,  88,  90,  93. 
Buchanan,  James,  250,  296. 
Burgwin,  Captain,  215,  217. 
Burr,  Aaron,  91. 

Cahokia,  taken  by  Clark,  50. 

Calhoun,  John  C,  222,  228. 

Calvt5,  52. 

Camp  Jackson,  301  ;  taken,  305 ;  ef- 
fect of  capture  of,  306,  307. 

Carthage,  skirmish  at,  315. 

Cathedral,  built,  124. 

Cavelier,  17,  18. 

Charless,  Joseph,  151. 

Chartres,  Fort,  32,  56. 

Chihuahua,  occupied,  209. 

Chouteau,  Auguste,  33,  122,  123. 

Chouteau,  Pierre,  99. 

Citizens,  interference  with,  346. 

Clark,  Major  M.  L.,  208. 

Clark,  General  George  R.,  50,  51,  52. 

Clark,  Governor  William,  92, 105,  116, 
117,  124. 

Clay,  Henry,  149,  155,  175,  192,  198. 

Clay's  compromise,  149,  155,  159. 

Commerce,  44. 

Conant,  Major,  312. 

Confederates,  hesitation  of,  318 ;  ad- 
vance of,  325,  326  ;  disagreements 
among,  327  ;  return  of,  361  ;  retreat 
of,  335  ;  surrender  of,  361. 

Constitution  of  1820,  163  ;  amended, 
165. 

Convention  of  1820,  150,  151. 

Convention  of  1861,  called,  278 ;  effect 
of,  278  ;  canvass  for  delegates  to, 
281 ;  election  of  members  to,  284, 
298  ;  second  session,  320 ;  adjourn- 
ment of,  290-363. 

Convention  of  1865,  364. 

Copper,  search  for,  22,  24. 

Cruzat,  Lieutenant-Governor,  50,  55. 


374 


INDEX. 


Currency,  164,  105. 
Curtis,  Geueral,  337. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  108. 

Delassus,   Lieutenaut  -  Governor,    44, 

50,  81,  VA. 
De  Leyba,  Lieutenant-Governor,  50. 
Democrats  successlul  in  election,  371. 
Deruisseau,  27. 
Desmoiues,  the,  explored,  24. 
De  Soto,  1,  2. 

Disabilities,  political,  removed,  369. 
Discontent  with  Federal  rule,  343. 
Disfranchisement  of  rebels,  355. 
Doniphan,   Colonel   A.    W.,  183,  184, 

204,  205,  207,  212. 
Douay.  Father,  17,  18. 
Dubourg,  Bishop,  123,  125. 
Ducharme,  51. 
Dutigne,  24. 
Duke,  Basil  W.,  298. 
Du  Lhut,  14. 
Dyer,  Lieutenant,  216. 

Earthquake,  the  New  Madrid,  108. 
Easton,  Rufus,  88. 
Edmonson,  Major,  215. 
Education,  23G. 
Edwards,  Governor,  105. 
Elections,  interference  with,  354. 
Election  of  ISGO  for  President,  264. 
Election  of  1S44,  192. 
Election  of  1840,  107. 
Eliot,  Rev.  William  G.,  353. 
Emancipation,  173,  175-363. 
Emancipation  proclamation,  344. 
Emigrant  Aid  companies,  242. 
E^\1ng,  General  Thomas,  350. 
Exchange  Bank,  166. 
Exports,  127. 

Federal  advance,  337. 
Filley,  Oliver  D.,  310. 
Fletcher,  Governor  Thomas  C,  361, 

302,  365,  368. 
Flint,  Timothy,  95,  96. 
Florida,  divided,  69. 
Fort  Crevecoeur,  13,  14. 
Fort  Orleans,  25. 
Fort  St.  Louis  of  the  Illinois,  15. 
Fremont,  General  John  C,  325,  336. 
French  wars,  3. 
Frontenac,  7,  16. 
Frost,  General  D.  M.,  258,  292,  299, 

301,  304,  306. 
Fur-trade,  4,  13,  24,  26,  32,  128. 

Gaines,  General  E.  P.,  199,  200. 
Galvez,  Governor,  51,  52,  71. 
Gamble,  Governor H.  R.,  176,296,  320, 

343,  363,  364. 
Gantt,  Thomas  T., 312. 


Gardoqui,  59. 

Gayoso,  58. 

Geyer,  Henry  S.,  the  Whig  candidate, 

elected  Senator,  231. 
Gilpin,  Major  William,  205,  207. 
Glenn,  Luther  J. ,  266. 
Glover,  Samuel  T.,  303,  368. 
Granby  Jlines,  316. 
Granger,  Postmaster-General,  87. 
Greene,  Colton,  298. 
Groseilliers,  C. 
Guadalupe   Hidalgo,    treaty  of,   212, 

217. 
Guibor,  Captain,  315,  317. 

Hall,  W.  A.,  290,  312. 

Hall,  W.  P.,  204,  364. 

Halleck,  General  H.  W.,  348. 

Hammond,  Colonel,  88. 

Hard  money,  164. 

Hard  times,  136,  167, 170. 

Harding,  General  James,  316,  318, 
340. 

Harding,  Colonel  Chester,  Jr. ,  325. 

Harney,  General  W.  S.,  258,  298,  304, 
309,  311. 

Harrison,  William  H.,  54,  88,  171. 

Haughn's  Mills,  massacre  at,  183. 

Hempstead,  Ed.,  115. 

Hennepin,  Father,  14. 

Hindes,  Russell,  257,  258. 

Home  guards,  organized,  277 ;  mus- 
tered into  service,  297. 

Howard,  Governor,  102,  105,  108, 116. 

IbervUIe,  19,  20. 

Illinois,  the  district  of,  39. 

Immigrants,  character  of,  98 ;  num- 
ber of,  117  ;  life  of,  118. 

Indians,  war  with,  25-105  ;  exemption 
from  attacks  of,  53  ;  removal  of, 
55 ;  specimens  of  eloquence,  54, 
102,  204;  treaties  with,  84,  99,  103, 
107,  205  ;  treatment  of,  53,  54,  100. 

Insurrection,  New  Mexican,  212. 

Internal  improvements,  233. 

Interview  between  Jackson  and  Lyon, 
312. 

Iroquois  war,  5. 

Jackson,  Andrew,  190. 

Jackson,  Colonel  Congreve,  207. 

Jackson,  Governor  C.  F.,  221,  267, 
270,  292,  298,  314,  318;  refuses 
troops  to  federal  government,  299 ; 
proclamation  of,  313. 

Jackson  resolutions,  221,  223 ;  mean- 
ing of,  226. 

Jamestown,  settled.  3. 

Jefferson,  Thomas,  77,  82,  84,  87,  93. 

Joliet,  4,  7,  12  ;  descends  the  Missis- 
sippi, 9. 


INDEX. 


375 


Joutel,  17, 18. 
Jurisprudence,  system  of,  40. 

Kansas,  visited,  24  ;  character  of  im- 
iniffrants  to,  243,  245,  247,  248 ; 
jayliawkers,  251 ;  first  election  in, 
249,  250 ;  report  on  troubles  in,  253. 

Kaskasliia, 21,.5G  ;  founded, 22  ;  taken 
by  Clark,  5(1. 

Kearney,  General  S.  W.,  200,  202, 
205,  'il2. 

Kennett,  Luther  M.,  elected  to  Con- 
gress, 231. 

King,  Rufus,  CS,  138. 

La  Barre,  Governor,  16. 

Laclede,  33. 

Lake  Superior,  4. 

Land  grants,  24  ;  amount  of,  60 ;  con- 
firmed, 01,  84,  112  ;  liberality  of, 
58,  59  ;  in  New  Madrid,  111  ;  school 
purposes,  112 ;  made  to  settlers, 
4G. 

Land,  increase  in  value  of,  59,  94, 123. 

Lane,  James  H.,  334,  347,  348,  349. 

L'Annee  du  coup,  50. 

L'Annee  des  dix  ba/leaux,  55. 

L^Annee  des  grands  eaux,  55. 

La  Salle,  6,  13,  14, 15,  16, 18,  19, 

Laussat,  80. 

Lawrence,  massacre  of,  350. 

Lead,  amount  rained,  127. 

Lead  mines,  23,  24-26. 

LeClerc,  Father,  17. 

Legislature,  organized,  267,  280 ;  ad- 
journment of,  290  ;  summoned  to 
meet,  300 ;  resolves  to  secede,  336. 

Le  Sonueur,  speech  of,  102. 

Lewis  and  Clark,  expedition  of,  92. 

Lewis,  Governor  Merriwether,  92,  93, 
99,  102. 

Lexington,  campaign  of,  334. 

Libraries,  123. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  108,  266,  311,  345, 
348,  351,  364. 

Linn,  Lewis  F.,  186. 

Lisa,  Manuel,  128. 

Living.ston,  R.  K,  68,  76,  77. 

Loan  certificates,  136. 

Louisiana,  colony  of,  a  failure,  28  ; 
population  of,  29  ;  cost  of  colony  of, 
29,  30,  41  ;  given  to  Spain,  31  ;  taxes 
in,  41 ;  divided,  32  ;  purchased,  77, 
80. 

Louisiana  territory,  87,  115. 

Louisiana,  district  of,  82. 

Lovejoy,  Rev.  E.  P.,  176,  177,  178. 

Lucas,  J.  B.  C,  87,  88. 

Lyon,  General  Nathaniel,  294, 297, 298, 
302,  305,  312,  314,  325,  329,  330,332. 

Madison,  James,  68,  75,  78. 


Maklot,  J.,  128. 

Mamiers  and  customs,  42. 

Manufactures,  44. 

Marmaduke,  Governor  John  S.,  309, 

314,  340. 

Marquette,  Father,  4,  6,  8,  9,  10,  12. 

Membrt;,  Father,  14,  15, 17. 

Message,  Governor  Stewart's,  268. 

Message,  Governor  Jackson's,  272. 

Mexico,  French  expedition  to,  22  j  re- 
volt from  Spain,  190. 

Military  law,  the,  300. 

Miro,  Governor,  49,  59. 

Missionaries,  zeal  of,  4. 

Mississippi,  discovered  and  explored, 
1,  6,  8,  14,  15  ;  a  French  river,  20 ; 
closed  to  the  United  States,  72 ; 
navigation  of,  130. 

Missouri,  applies  for  admission,  138  ; 
debate  on  admission,  142,  154;  ad- 
mission of,  objected  to,  152;  admitted 
into  the  Confederacy,  336 ;  admitted 
into  the  Union,  158,  161  ;  character 
of  population  of,  200 ;  evacuated  by 
Confederates,  341,  342,  357. 

Missouri  Compromise,  adopted,  146 ; 
Southern  vote  for,  147  ;  its  effect, 
149, 158  ;  violated  and  repealed,  186, 
241  ;  unconstitutional,  353. 

Missouri  Confederates,  1st  and  2d 
Brigades,  339;  number  of,  340; 
mortality  among,  357. 

Missouri  Federals,  number  of,  340, 
357  ;  mortality  among,  357. 

Missouri  state  guard,  organization  of, 
316  ;  ordered  to  be  raised,  319. 

Missourians  not  secessionists,  222,  229, 
230-264  ;  nor  slavery  propagandists, 
226,  230. 

Mitchell,  Colonel  D.  D.,  207. 

Montgomery,  257. 

Morales,  li,  75. 

Mormon  war,  179. 

Mormons,  driven  from  the  State,  183 ; 
move  to  Illinois,  185  ;  driven  from 
Illinois,  185. 

Museum  of  Indian  articles,  124. 

McCuUoch,  General    Benjamin,   314, 

315,  319,  320,  328,  330,  333,  338. 
McClurg,  Governor  J.  W.,  369. 
McDonald,  Captain  Emmett,  released 

by  the  court,  300. 

Napton,  W.  B.,221. 

Nelson,  Captain,  ascends  the  Missouri, 
133. 

New  Mexico,  annexed,  202  ;  end  of  in- 
surrection in,  217  ;  insurrection  in, 
212  ;  purchase  of,  219. 

Newspaper,  first,  published  in  Missou- 
ri, 123. 

Nicolet,  on  the  Wisconein,  4. 


376  INDEX. 


Ohio  River,  discovered,  6. 
Oliio  valley,  population  of,  75. 
Order  restored  in  Missouri,  3G2. 
Order  No.  11,  350. 
Order  of  enrollment,  343. 
Ordinance  of  1787,  57. 
O'Reilly,  37,  53. 
Osage  River,  explored,  24. 
Owens,  Samuel  C,  killed,  209. 

Pea  Ridge,  battle  of,  338. 

Pearce,  General,  32G. 

P(5nicaut,  21. 

Perez,  Lieutenant-Governor,  55. 

Phelps,  John  S.,  370. 

Piasa  Bluffs,  9. 

Piernas,  Lieutenant-Governor,  50. 

Pierre,  Don  Eugenic,  70. 

Pinckney,  Charles,  154. 

Pittman,  Captain,  27. 

Pl.^tte  purchase,  the,  185 ;  a  violation 
of  the  Missouri  Compromise,  186. 

Pleasanton,  General,  3G0. 

Plummer,  Captain,  330,  331. 

Politics,  47. 

Political  power,  162,  371. 

Political  parties,  294. 

Polk,  James  K.,  193,  198,  204,  218. 

Post-offices  established,  123. 

Prairie  du  Chien,  attack  on,  105. 

Price,  General  Sterling,  306,  309,  310, 
313,  31C,  326,  328-330,  333,  335; 
farewell  to  state  guard,  338 ;  in 
New  Mexico,  213,  215,  217,  219; 
elected  president  of  the  convention, 
286  ;  raids  into  Missouri,  3C0. 

Price,  Major  Thomas  H.,  317. 

Price-Harvey  agreement,  the,  309. 

Quebec  settled,  3. 

Radisson,  6. 

Raids,  359,  360. 

Railroads,  aided,  235. 

Randolph,  John,  84,  90. 

Read,  Jacob,  132. 

Rebels,  disfranchised,  355,  367. 

R^icollet  mission,  on  Lake  Huron,  5. 

Reeder,  Governor  A.  H.,  249. 

Reid,  Captain  John  W.,  205,  209; 
rescues  Mexican  captives,  210. 

Religion,  48. 

Remonstrance  and  petition,  83. 

Report  of  Committee  on  Federal  Re- 
lations, 287. 

Retreat  of  state  guard,  314. 

Riddick,  Thomas  F.,  114. 

Robinson,  Governor  Charles,  letter  to 
Fremont,  348,  349. 

Rollins,  James  S.,  defends  Mormons, 
184. 


Sacramento,  battle  of,  208. 
Safety  committee,  members  of,  303 ; 
meeting  of,  303  ;  circular  of,  310. 

Santa  Fe,  taken,  200  ;  overland  trade 
with,  201. 

Schewe,  C.  F.,  125. 

Schofield,  General  J.  M.,  343,  344, 
351. 

Schools,  47,  124. 

School  fund,  amount  of,  239. 

Schurz,  Carl,  309. 

Shelby,  General  J.  O.,  340. 

Shot,  manufactured,  128. 

Sigel,  General  F.,  315, 329,  333. 

Silver,  search  for,  22. 

Slavery,  introduced,  24;  profitable, 
27,  46;  position  of  South  on  ques- 
tion of,  148  ;  sanctioned  in  Missouri, 
151  ;  division  of  parties  on,  162  ; 
decline  of  agitation,  172 ;  agitation 
of,  renewed,  220  ;  abolished,  365. 

Slaves,  number  of,  244,  260. 

Slidell,  John,  199. 

Smith,  Hyrum,  185. 

Smith,  Joseph,  179,  184,  185. 

Snead,  Colonel  Thomas  L.,  298,  312, 
316. 

Society,  state  of,  93. 

Solemn  public  act,  the,  156. 

Spain,  in  Louisiana,  36 ;  closes  the 
Mississippi,  72  ;  troubles  with,  372. 

Speculation,  mania  for,  134,  167,  169. 

Springfield,  occupied  by  Lyon,  324; 
battle  of,  330. 

State  Bank,  chartered,  164. 

State  convention  of  1820,  150,  151. 

State  debt,  235. 

State  guard,  309;  broken  up,  338, 
339. 

State  university  established,  185. 

St.  Ange  de  Bellerive,  35,  50,  56. 

St.  Esprit,  mission  of,  4. 

Ste.  Genevieve,  founded,  21. 

St.  Ignatius,  mission  of,  7. 

St.  Hdefonso,  treaty  of,  63. 

St.  Louis,  attack  on,  50 ;  fortified,  55 ; 
progress  of,  122  ;  population  of, 
126  ;  trade  of,  127. 

St.  Train,  215. 

Steamboat,  the  first,  on  western  rivers, 
131. 

Sterling,  Captain,  33. 

Stewart,  Governor  R.  M.,  223,  231. 

Stoddard,  Major  Amos,  81,  82. 

Stringfellow,  B.  F.,  231,  246. 

Strong,  Geo.  P.,  365. 

Sturgis,  Major  S.  D.,  314,  332. 

Sweeny,  General  T.  W.,  298,  311. 

Tallmadge's   amendment,    138,    141, 

142. 
Taos,  capture  of,  216. 


INDEX. 


377 


Tappan,  Arthur,  174,  175. 

Taylor,  General  Zachary,  200,  211,  212. 

Tecumseh,  IOC. 

Territory,  population  of,  8G,  121. 

Texas,  exchanged  for  Florida,  148, 
189  ;  efforts  to  recover,  ISt) ;  revolts 
from  Mexico,  190  ;  independence 
of,  acknowledged,  190  ;  annexation 
of,  189,  191,  198  ;  a  party  question, 
192  ;  admitted  into  the  Union,  198. 

Thomas,  Jesse  B.,  author  of  the  Mis- 
souri Compromise,  149. 

Thornton,  Captain,  attacked  by  Mex- 
icans, 199. 

Tippecanoe,  battle  of,  106. 

Toleration,  religious,  58,  59. 

Tomas,  217. 

Tompkins,  George,  125. 

Tonti,  14,  10,  18,  20. 

Totten,  Captain,  330.  331,  332. 

Treaty  of  Madrid,  74;  of  Paris,  31, 
69  ;  with  England,  09. 

Trudeau,  Lieutenant-Governor,  49, 
54,  50. 

Tyler,  John,  187,  190. 

UUoa,  34,  37,  81. 
United  States  Bank,  104,  167. 
United  States  Constitution,  violated 
by  Northern  States,  265. 


United  States,  protest  of,  against  ces- 
sion of  Louisiana  to  France,  68. 

United  States  take  possession  of 
Louisiana,  81. 

University,  St.  Louis,  125. 

Van  Buren,  M.,  170,  190. 
Van  Dorn,  General  Earl,  337. 
Vaudreiiil,  Governor,  24,  27. 
VigU,  Cornelio,  215. 
Village  lots,  40-112. 

War  with   England,    105,   100;   with 

Mexico,  199. 
Weightman,    Captain    Richard,   208, 

211. 
Wells,  Carty,  221. 
Whigs,  the,  disappointed,  187. 
Wilkinson,  General  James,  SO,  87,  89, 

90,  91,  92. 
Williams,  Henry  W.,  111. 
Wilson,  John,  account  by,  of  a  secret 

meeting  in  favor  of  emancipation, 

174. 
Wilson,  Lieutenant,  216. 
Wisconsin,  the,  discovered  by  Nicolet, 

4,  G. 

Yeatman,  James  E.,  29G. 


I 


46 


i^ 


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